Calendar Girl
by Nancy T
Summary: How John Winchester met Mary Campbell, with tips on chupacabra killing and exorcising a haunted 1967 Impala. Based on a wonderful plot bunny from sphynxcat.
1. Miss July

**1970**

Tom Wilson pulled the car into the parking space downtown that was nearest to the bridge, cut the engine and the headlights. The bridge sprang directly from the intersecting street, but its nearest light was yards away, on the other side of a one-story row of offices. Sitting in a black car on a deserted nighttime avenue underneath a street light that was out, he felt as if he could simply disappear. Disappear, he thought, saying the word over in his head, a mental mantra.

The note lay on the seat next to him. He'd written it in a bar. He kept thinking someone would wonder what he was writing, but no one even noticed. Like he was already gone.

He tipped his head back against the seat. God, he loved this car. Loved it from the moment he saw it, late '66. He hadn't gone too far then, he could've turned himself around. But he had to have this car. And then Cathy's face, open with surprise and admiration when he drove it up the driveway.

It was all for her, really. She deserved the best. All for her.

He shook his head a little. He knew it was bull. He was tired of self-justification and tired of self-hatred and tired of the argument between them raging in his head. He wanted it to disappear.

He tried to remember Cathy's face again, but now all he could picture was how pinched and tense it had looked this afternoon. She wasn't going to scream at him, wouldn't kick him when he was down, but at the same time she couldn't bear to look at him. She had pored obsessively over the Attorneys section of the Yellow Pages, trying to judge who was good and who was a shyster by comparing their ads, because she was too humiliated to call any of her friends or relatives and ask for the name of a good criminal attorney.

Whether through attorney's fees or reparations, of course, they'd lose the house. But a relatively young woman can move halfway across the country back to her parents' house, start her life over again, with some secrecy and dignity as a widow. She can't do that with an unemployable jailbird husband in tow.

He'd known it was coming for days, knowledge accompanied by a persistent nausea that wouldn't let him vomit and get it over with. Last night he'd thought he couldn't go through another night like this, knowing that, actually, worse evenings were in store. Tonight he'd decided he _wouldn't_ go through another night like that, and at the decision his stomach had settled. He'd even been able to smile at Cathy before he left, tell her they'd get through this somehow.

He lunged out of the car, listening to the solid sound of the door closing with the pleasure it always gave him, and started down the bridge. The Kansas River was wide and the water moved rapidly at that point, the tree-lined banks swallowed in darkness. The bridge lights touched and vanished on the tops of fast-moving ripples, looking like dozens of fantastical creatures down in the blackness that appeared and then vanished before you could focus your gaze on them.

– One bad second. Then it's all over.

A car zoomed through the intersection, its tires squealing, racing away from the bridge. He looked back over his shoulder.

Then he went back to the black car and turned on its emergency flashers. He'd destroyed himself. No point in destroying his cherished car by leaving it almost invisible in the darkness all night.

He ran his hand over the hood as he walked back to the railing, and this time he went to the bridge's highest point. The river sound below was a hushed shushing, as though it were urging quiet.

His body was spotted after dawn by a bridge worker; it hadn't gone far, washing up on a tiny islet in the middle of the river. The impact hadn't killed him, but had apparently knocked him unconscious, and the rushing water had done the rest.

At about the same time, a Lawrence policeman was running the plates of the black Impala that had been sitting downtown for hours, its emergency flashers quietly ticking.

**1972**

When John Winchester treated himself to lunch out, it was usually at the Woolworth's downtown, where the motherly women at the counter recognized and chatted with their regulars. He should've known better than to lunch at a place that featured, on the wall behind the counter, the popular poster of a little old lady flipping the bird. But he was in a hurry, on the other side of town, and someone had told him that this place had a good omelette.

Which it did, and he chewed morosely, wishing there was a publication anywhere in here with a sports section and that the guy sitting at the nearby table would shut up. " – not even mainly the racial thing," he was saying. "Look, you take a bunch of hyper-macho cases, shut them up in a ship, send 'em off to kill people, and what happens? There's a riot! What a surprise! No one else to get violent with, the lab rats turn on each other!"

"Probably the Navy's way of culling the herd," said the long-haired braless girl behind the counter.

"Herd is right. Animals."

"They'd been at sea on combat duty for eight months," John said quietly, because he did read things other than the sports section. "They'd just been told that their tours were extended. They weren't going home like they thought, they were going back to combat duty."

The girl looked at him and over at the other guy.

"So," the guy said carefully, "so, what you're saying is, they were under a lot of stress."

"Not really an excuse, but yeah, they were."

"Because they had to go back to sending bombers off to destroy innocent villagers. I dunno, it seems to me like the people under stress there were the folks getting bombed."

"Well, no, Dave," the girl said, "they don't have feelings like the rest of us, remember? They're just gooks."

"Oh yeah," Dave said at the same time that John said, "My whole time there, I only ever heard one guy use that word."

"I believe you completely." Dave's voice was rich with phony sincerity.

"I don't get it," the girl said to John, sounding honestly befuddled. "If you're in Vietnam and you truly think of the Vietnamese as human beings, how do you justify what you're doing to them?"

"That's the beauty of the military," Dave said. "You don't have to think about anything. 'Yes sir! Yes sir!' That's it."

John stood sharply, getting a sneaking pleasure at the way Dave jumped, put just enough money on the counter to pay for his omelette and left.

When he was just outside the door he heard the girl say, "Y'all come back now, y'hear?" in an exaggerated accent, and Dave laughing.

John didn't slam the car door when he got in, but there was no question it got closed. He put his hands on the steering wheel and stared at it for a moment.

Then he smiled a little, shaking his head.

– When I have my own garage, I've got to remember not to go around forcing my opinions on customers. You either sound like a snot-nosed college brat or a ninety-year-old geezer. Either way, not good for business.

And that reminded him that he was in a hurry. He started the car, only now beginning to feel the November chill.

It took only five minutes to get to the one-story building surrounded by a huge parking lot and fronted with the sign, "Lawrence Used Auto – Serving You Since 1958!" He pulled the yellow Mustang parallel with a row of other cars, got out and started unloading the trunk. His boss, Curt Bailey, came out of the office, his tie flapping in the sudden sharp wind that had sprung up, and started helping. "How did she drive?"

"Just fine. All it needed was a good tune-up, tire balance and rotation."

"Great. I thought we got a deal with this car." Curt closed the trunk and patted it. "I almost feel like I should've made him a better offer."

"You made him a great offer," John said, "considering that he hadn't serviced the thing since he bought it. I'll give this row a good wash after I put this stuff away."

"Actually, I've got another project for you." Their arms full, they were walking briskly toward the office. "Uh, by the way, a customer took the Impala for a test drive."

John stopped dead as Curt opened the door. "I don't want to hear this."

"Freezing cold. Had the heater turned up full blast, might as well have been air conditioning. Needless to say, no deal."

"It's impossible!" John dropped his load of office and car maintenance supplies on the desk. "Well. Obviously it's not. I've just missed something, that's all. I'll go over it again."

"I'm not blaming you. I know the kind of work you do."

"Did it moan at you?"

Curt chuckled. "The only person who ever said that Impala made a moaning sound was that loon who bought it and returned it a week later. And Ed said he heard it, right before he quit."

"Ed?"

"Salesman who left here right before you came on board. Son of a bitch."

Curt swore so seldom that John, putting away supplies, glanced over his shoulder in surprise.

"Figured out after he left that when he was supposedly reconciling the petty cash at night he was dipping into it. Not too much at a time, but I bet it came to a thousand or two all told."

"Did you press charges?"

Curt shrugged. "By this time, it wouldn't be worth trying to prove it in court. But I hope every car the jerk ever drives moans at him."

"It's a shame. Great car like that Impala, I mean."

"It's been kind of a labor of love for you, hasn't it? Hey, do you want it? I'd give you a price break."

With a reluctant sigh and smile, John shook his head. "I couldn't afford it, even with the break."

"You know, I'd put you on full-time if I could."

Curt was really too soft-hearted to be a used-car dealer, John thought. Good thing he was in Lawrence, Kansas; in a bigger city he'd have been eaten alive. "Don't worry about it. I'm knocking on doors, my dad's putting out feelers. I'll get full-time work soon. Actually, I'm kind of enjoying the time off."

"Sort of making a gradual transition to civilian life?"

"Something like that. OK. Wash the cars first, or go over the Impala?"

"Actually, another project. And I'm sorry to stick you with it, but Doris is at her mother's house for the week and you know my handwriting. I need about seventy envelopes addressed."

It was John's turn to shrug. "Work's work. Why the mass mailing?"

"The calendars came in."

"Calendars?"

"We did the photos earlier this year. I've been fighting with the photographer and the printer ever since. But I think the end result is worth it." Curt was digging into an opened cardboard box on the floor as he spoke and now straightened, handing a square wall calendar to John.

The cover caption was "Lawrence Used Auto – Let's Drive! 1973". The cover shot showed a pretty girl in a short white coat and an only slightly longer skirt. She was leaning over the windshield of a bright red car with an ice scraper, looking at the camera with her lips slightly puckered as though scraping imaginary ice were an unexpectedly difficult task. The leaning caused her skirt to ride up enough to show that she had very well shaped upper thighs. Her shoes were wholly unsuited for winter, making it just as well that the sparkling snow heaped on the ground around her was patently fake.

John didn't laugh often, but when he did he grinned broadly and his chest shook. He just made no sound. "Are you selling the car or the girl?"

Curt seemed offended. "Hey, this is just good old-fashioned cheesecake. It's nothing compared to what the skin magazines are doing now."

"That's true," John said, still smiling as he turned the pages. The cover shot was repeated as Miss January, Miss February was predictably pink and lacy.

"I've gotta do something to unload some of these hulks. Maybe the girls will glamour them up."

Miss April was a real beauty by anyone's standard. "What modeling agency did you use?" John asked.

"You think I could afford to use professional models? These are all local girls. They were thrilled to earn a hundred bucks for standing around looking pretty for a few hours."

John was giving his silent laugh again. "You don't figure you'll unload the Charger by June?"

"I'll be lucky if I'm rid of that thing by next November," Curt said glumly.

John turned a page and was quiet as Curt continued, "You know, with Libya and OPEC and everything, I think the trend is going to be to smaller cars. Higher gas mileage is going to be a big selling point."

"Wow," John said.

Curt looked over at him. He was staring at the calendar, and his grin had taken on a slightly stupid quality.

"Which one?" Curt asked, looking over the top of the calendar. "Oh, Miss July. Not my personal favorite, but yeah, she's cute."

"Wow," John said.

Not the classic beauty of Miss April; not the deliberate provocativeness of Miss January. A pretty, fresh-faced blonde who smiled directly into the camera with mischief and – maybe a hint of defiance, a little challenge?

She was stretched out on the hood of a long black car, her right elbow propped on the windshield, showing her long legs to advantage. She was wearing navy blue short shorts and a red-and-white blouse pulled down off of her shoulders and unbuttoned enough to show modest but promising cleavage. Her left hand, bent slightly backward and gracefully at the wrist, clasped a small American flag. Her silver charm bracelet accented the slenderness of her arm; a red barrette accented the golden hair. One of her feet was slightly over the side of the car, dangling a bright red sandal as if she were about to kick it off. Her lips were a muted dusky red, and for a moment, John thought it was a shame that the color scheme hadn't been carried through to red fingernail and toenail polish. Then he decided, no, this was right. This girl wasn't a porn star; without the eye-catching outfit, she'd look wholesome, fresh-scrubbed. Now there was a thought to dwell on.

"See?" Curt said triumphantly. "I bet you have a whole new feeling for that Impala now, don't you?"

Actually, he hadn't even noticed the car, but didn't want to depress Curt by saying so. Sure enough, Miss July was reposing on the '67 Impala with the temperature control problem.

"Why not," he cleared his throat, "why not a red car?"

"We were going to pose her with a white GTO, but it actually sold the day before, and that day the loon who said the Impala moaned at him all week brought it back. Like I say, I think the trend is going to be to smaller cars. I figured I'd better do my best by the Impala if I was going to get it out of here."

John nodded, not taking his eyes off the picture.

"He actually shot that one outdoors, real bright day. She climbed up on that thing and posed for, I dunno, a couple of hours. I was doing business, you know. Came by when they were wrapping up and helped her off the hood. The thing was hotter than the hubs of Hades, and she'd been sitting on it in shorts, smiling, that whole time. She's tougher than she looks."

"I'll bet," John said. "What's her name?"

Curt grinned. "You know, there's five more months."

John looked up at him, and Curt swallowed an outright laugh. "Mary something. I could look it up."

"Is she married?"

"Don't think so. Anyway, I don't remember her saying she needed to ask her husband's permission. I met her at the courthouse when I was filing a deed."

"What was she filing?"

"Nothing. She was working there."

John looked at his watch. "OK if I take the envelopes and address list home with me and work on them tonight?"

Curt grinned and started gathering them. "Best of luck. Let me know."

"Can I keep this calendar?"

"Sure."

John made the walk to the bus stop quickly, the wait for the bus patiently, and the ride downtown self-questioningly (How many Marys do you suppose work in the Register of Deeds office? Exactly how insane is she going to think I am?). Alas, when he got there he was able to answer the first but not the second. When he asked for Mary the middle-aged woman at the counter knew immediately who he was talking about, but said she only worked there part-time and she wasn't there today, could someone else help him? He said no thanks, and started the long walk to his father's house with his eyes not really focused on anything in front of him.

He went back to the courthouse the next morning, and was told that on the days when Mary was there she worked only afternoon shifts. The young woman with whom he spoke this time was chattier than the woman from yesterday, and told him that she thought Mary helped out her dad on some kind of family business at nights and slept late. John would've loved to ask her Mary's last name, but figured that might make her suspicious of him, so he just said he'd catch up with Mary later and went to work.

Curt had looked up Mary's last name; it was Campbell. Unfortunately, John was needed at work all afternoon. And, of course, that was Friday.

Over the weekend, just for the heck of it, he checked to see how many Campbells there were in the Lawrence-area directory. There were twenty-four. That would be a lot of knocking on doors, but he didn't intend to do that except as a last resort. John knew he was no expert on women, but he did know that a young man showing up at a girl's home and saying, "I'm here because I saw your calendar picture," was likely to result in, at best, a call to the police by the girl and, at worst, presentation of a shotgun by her boyfriend. No, better to introduce himself someplace public, unthreatening.

And remember to smile. A female friend of his in high school had let him in on the fact that he was perceived as intense, and some girls found that kind of a turn-on but others found it a little scary. The problem was knowing how Mary Campbell would react, but until he knew, he decided to smile a lot when he met her, to try to seem, as the druggies would say, mellow.

He looked for full-time work over the weekend; if you're going to take a girl out regularly, you need a steady income and a car. At nights he watched sports with his father, both of them munching on TV dinners. A couple of times his father inquired where exactly his mind was lately.

* * *

At about the time that John went to bed Sunday night, Mary Campbell and her father Samuel were staggering across ranchland lit only by a truck's headlights, carrying a half of a side of raw beef. Tall and muscular, Samuel was carrying most of the weight, but Mary was keeping up her end.

"Placement's the thing," her father was saying. "We want it as far from the truck as possible and still be able to hit it with the headlights."

At that moment, Mary stepped in an uneven sport on the rough ground and fell, her side of the beef hitting the ground with her.

Samuel laughed. "OK, yeah, that's a good spot." He dropped his side. "You OK?"

"M-hm," Mary said. They both went back to the truck. Her father took from it the cow's blood he'd got at the butcher shop that day and a pair of heavy spikes. Mary took the large folded piece of cloth, the net and the sledge hammer.

By the truck's headlights, Samuel poured the blood thoroughly all over the side of beef. Mary draped the cloth, mottled in a way that in the dim light could have passed for a cow's hide, over the bloody meat and bone, and the two of them spread a small-mesh but heavy-duty fishing net over the whole thing. Samuel anchored the net on one side of the beef by driving the two stakes, larger than the net's holes, through the net into the ground. The net was left untethered on the other side of the meat.

"Do you really think the cloth is necessary?" Samuel asked during this process. "Chupacabras find prey by smell mostly, not sight."

"I just want it to look a little like a cow. Well, a calf."

"You think this thing is smart enough to know what a trap is?"

"It's come all the way from Durango to Kansas by a zig-zag trail. It had really good hunters after it outside Amarillo and Enid, and got away both times. I don't know if it's smart, but I think it has really good instincts."

"Well," her father said, unloading the shotguns from the truck, "you're the world's expert on this particular specimen, so we'll play it your way."


	2. Born Hunter

_OOPS! I forgot to say in the first installment that: The television show "Supernatural," including the characters John Winchester, Mary Campbell, Samuel Campbell, and Deana Campbell, is copyrighted by Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc._

Samuel tossed one of the guns to Mary and sat on the ground, leaning back against the truck's front bumper. She did the same in front the ranch owner's car she'd driven down here, adjusting the sheath that carried her hunting knife so it didn't dig into her leg. The car and the truck sat yards apart, facing each other, the bait squarely in between.

"The world's expert on this particular specimen." He'd given her several compliments like that lately, and she couldn't tell if he genuinely thought her work was getting better or if he was starting to sense how much she disliked it.

Actually, she had enjoyed the research aspects. When the hunter in Amarillo had tried to kill the chupacabra and came away with a clawing so severe he'd needed three units of blood, he started calling other hunters all over the Midwest from his hospital bed. Samuel and Deana Campbell had been busy ridding a house of an especially nasty poltergeist, so they'd suggested that their daughter create a map tracking the creature's movements. They really didn't think it would move this far north before turning around, so this was essentially an academic exercise for Mary.

She'd looked for reports of cattle deaths and unexplained livestock illness in newspapers at the library downtown, but made minimal progress. The small farm and ranch communities most likely to be victimized wouldn't have newspapers noteworthy enough to be in a library hundreds of miles away. She made phone calls to hunters all the way from Mexico to Missouri for leads, fumbling through her high-school Spanish, leaving messages on answering machines and hearing back several days later, following up the leads she got with calls to local papers or university extensions. A pattern began to emerge, a slow, zig-zag spiral across the map.

By her reckoning, the creature should have struck somewhere near Dodge City, and it annoyed her that there was a completely dead space on her map in that area. Now pretending to be from a university extension herself, she started calling small towns in the area.

After a talk with law enforcement in Hanston, Kansas, she sat up until two in the morning waiting for her parents to come home.

No, the Hanston sergeant had told her, they hadn't had any unexplained cattle deaths lately. The only mysterious animal death at all had been his six-year-old nephew's dog, and the only reason that had attracted notice was because of what happened the same night that the dog died. His nephew had wakened his parents complaining that a big porcupine was trying to get into the slightly ajar window of his room. Discounting the "porcupine" as a child's confusion of dream and reality, it seemed clear that some dangerous nut had killed the child's dog and tried to get into the child's room; they'd sent out alerts to every newspaper, radio station, TV station and law enforcement body in the area.

So this thing was starting to get interested in human beings, and this was no longer an academic exercise. Samuel researched killing chupacabras while Mary continued her map, and now here they were, in a deserted field hours west of Lawrence, sitting on either side of bait that the creature could smell fifteen miles away.

The quiet and darkness were profound; they were five miles from the nearest small town, a mile from the ranch owner's house. She couldn't see her father yards away, but she could see at least three times as many stars as she could see at night in Lawrence. Cold wind swept in an unbroken wave across the plain, biting her face and hands. She was wearing thermal long underwear, jeans, boots, a flannel shirt and a denim jacket, so the rest of her wasn't too uncomfortable. What she did hate was having to pull a roll of toilet paper out of the glove box of the truck and squatting to relieve herself. At least she only had to do that once in the hours they waited.

"Talk to me," Samuel said eventually, which was his way of saying "Don't fall asleep."

Actually, she had been nodding. She forced herself back to full consciousness. "Why do you think a chupacabra is a kind of demon? It could just be its own species of creature."

"Its being a demon would explain a lot. Killing livestock needed by humans instead of wild animals. How fast they decompose after death, so you don't have anything left to analyze. Fear without understanding, it's what Hell thrives on. Plus the way it moves. By all the laws of physics, nothing that size and shape should be able to move like that. Just about has to be demonic."

She let her amusement show in her voice, since he wouldn't be able to see her smile. "By all the laws of physics?"

"Hey, I went to school."

She giggled, then broke off in the middle.

"You hear that?" Samuel asked at the same moment.

It was hard to describe – a toy remote control car possessed by a demon? A gigantic mosquito? An angry zzzzz that was clearly closer the second time they heard it than the first.

The third time they heard it there was also a thud as something heavy landed on their bait.

God, that thing could move. Mary and Samuel were both still getting to their feet when it landed. She ran to the car holding the shotgun in her left hand, reached into its open window and slammed the lights on.

The brights showed Samuel yanking at the untethered side of the net, which was now over by the stakes. He'd managed to throw it over the creature and was wrestling to tie down the untethered end before the chupacabra understood what was happening. It was already thrashing, and the light was supposed to stun it, but unfortunately it was facing away from the car when Mary hit the lights. It focused on Mary's father and gave a grating hiss, half rising on its back legs, ready to spring.

She knew there was no point in shooting a chupacabra in the back, but she had no choice. Even enmeshed, it could leap a yard or two and Samuel was just now finishing tying off the net. She emptied one barrel and in the light could see some of the pellets flying, ricocheting off the creature's back.

It gave a terrifying cry, like a small horse screaming combined with a huge cat hissing, as Samuel leaped away from the stake and rolled to avoid attack. The creature turned its focus on Mary as she ran to turn on the truck's lights, and she knew it was about to spring at her. She sensed a chance to shoot the thing in the belly but didn't have time to aim well as it sprang. She saw blood spray from its back leg when she shot and she shook the beast off the barrel of her gun, its fangs bared and missing her hand by inches as it fell.

Samuel, behind the chupacabra, spun the shotgun in his hand to use it like a club, slamming the stock down onto the creature's spined back. It gave that cry again, turning toward Samuel, and now Mary had the lights of the truck on, truly seeming to stun it. Before Samuel could shoot, it balled up on the ground, three of its legs pulled in and its neck weirdly doubled, the head tucked underneath the torso. Only the leg Mary had injured, apparently useless, stuck out from the ball of black quills covering armor plating with a row of reddish spines down the middle.

Samuel clubbed it again so hard that the thing bounced from the sheer force of the blow, but it remained as it was.

"Well, great," Samuel said, breathing heavily. "I suppose we could take turns standing around hitting it all night."

Mary crouched to look at it. "Can we flip it over?"

"Not without getting closer to it than a sane person would."

"Try hitting the injured leg. See if that makes it move," Mary suggested.

He did, and it did. With that hideous braying hiss, the creature snapped its head up and rose facing Mary, whose gun was empty. Without time to jump up, she fell on her back and pulled her knees up to cover her gut as the creature leaped. She brought the barrel of her gun up like a spear as it landed on her, forcing its face and front claws away from her. For a horrible moment it hung like that, its one good back claw digging into her shin as she screamed, its flat bat-like face inches from hers, the open mouth revealing protruding fangs, the eyes black from rim to rim like a shark's. Or a demon's.

Samuel brought his gun up between Mary's knees and her gun and the thing went flying, the claw ripping out of Mary's leg as it went. It landed on its back and before it could roll Samuel gave it both barrels in the belly.

The chupacabra thrashed spasmodically, unable to get upright, a well of blood burbling from its gut that shone in the lights. Yet still it bared its fangs and slashed its claws through the air, too dangerous to take with them, too dangerous to leave.

Mary let the pain in her leg give her rage enough to pull her hunting knife and plunge it into the creature's throat. Samuel struck aside the claw that moved toward her hand. Mary twisted the knife and yanked it out sharply. Blood sprayed over both of them, and finally, finally, the chupacabra lay still and silent.

"Are you all right?" Samuel asked immediately.

Mary held her hand to her leg. "I'm bleeding pretty bad."

"Stay still. Press your hand on it."

Samuel ran to the truck, where two big tackle boxes held enough medical supplies for a small hospital. He dropped to the ground in front of her, opening a box. "Let me see."

She removed her hand; he took a look and slapped a gauze pad on it. "That's not too bad. You'll be all right. Hold on." He wrapped bandaging around it quickly, going more for pressure at high speed than technique. "We'll wash it and take a look when we get back to the ranch house. Come on, get in the truck."

"His car," Mary said.

"He's a rancher. If he can't hike a mile across his own field to get his car he needs to change jobs."

He helped her to the truck, turned off the car's headlights, cut the net free from the stakes in the ground and used the net to drag the chupacabra's corpse to the back of the truck. Mary took the chance to lower her head and cry from the pain. She hated to do that in front of him.

There was a thud in the bed of the truck. Mary raised her head, wiped her face. Samuel sprang into the driver's seat and took off for the house.

The ranch owner opened the door, listened to Samuel, showed them to the kitchen. He had an odd look on his face that it took Mary a moment to interpret, and then she realized: He thought he was being taken. He must have changed his mind about the research they'd shown him earlier that day; he was thinking that the dirt on their sweaty faces, the blood splattering their clothes, the soaked red gauze pad on her shin and her limp, were all just a setup to make a fool out of him.

Well, that would change. At her insistence, they left her alone in the kitchen with the first aid kit while Samuel took the rancher out to show him the thing in the truck. Mary found a towel, ran water on it as cold as she could get, sat on the floor. She pulled off the bloody dressing and her boots and jeans, pulled up the leg of her long underwear, and applied the towel to the wound, grunting in pain. But of the three lacerations on her shin, only the middle one was still bleeding. She curled up, pressed the towel to her leg, rested her forehead on her knees and indulged in one of her favorite daydreams:

_Her friends meet her in the middle of the sun-washed quad, one of them moaning, "This is bad. This is so bad."_

_"She thinks she blew her math exam," the other friend explains._

_"Don't be silly! You always get great grades!" Mary says comfortingly. "And anyway, TGIF!"_

_"Yeah, true." The math student perks up. "What do you want to do this weekend?"_

_"I was thinking," her other friend says. "Why don't we drive down to Santa Monica tonight and spend all day Saturday. We could split the cost of gas and a hotel room. It's only two or three hours_

The front door slammed and the rancher's voice said, "God."

Mary raised her head, hearing Samuel say, "Have you got any bandages?"

"In the bathroom. Medicine chest."

Mary pulled the towel away from her leg. A surly trickle of blood leaked from the middle cut. She medicated and dressed the wound and pulled her clothes back on. As she was doing so, she could hear her father coming back into the front room and saying, "You know, I told you not to touch those spines."

"I just – I was looking to see if – "

"You were wondering if we stuck them onto a dead wolverine with Elmer's Glue," her father said dryly. "After we pushed its face in and cut its tail off."

"Are they – is it poisonous?"

Samuel knocked on the kitchen door. "You OK, honey?"

"I'm fine. I'll be out in a minute."

"No, they're not poisonous," she heard her dad telling the rancher. "And they don't carry diseases from the natural world, so you won't get tetanus or rabies. They just kill your cattle. And like we told you, this one was getting interested in human children."

"God," the rancher said again with a new shiver of horror in his voice.

Mary opened the door and limped into the front room. The ranch owner, sitting in an easy chair bandaging the palm of his hand, looked up at her in disbelief. "You – do you do this all the time?"

Samuel laughed. "Girls can be great hunters if they have the guts for it. You should see her mother go after a zombie."

Mary smiled.

"So if we could get a check, we'll be on our way," Samuel said.

"Oh! Yeah, right. Here." Still looking a little dazed, the rancher walked over to a leather coat hanging on a rack, pulled out a checkbook, sat down and began writing.

"Like you saw, that thing's already starting to decompose," Samuel said (sneaking a quick glance over the rancher's shoulder at the check). "In a couple of days there won't be anything left but what looks like the skeleton of a deformed dog."

"What about the spines?"

"Tendon, not bone. They'll go too. What I'm saying is, if you want to keep it and show it to anyone, better do it tomorrow."

"Show it to anyone?" The rancher looked up at Samuel as if he were crazy. Then he took the check out of the folder and handed it to him.

"Take that thing away," the rancher said. "My wife's on the county commission. My kids are in school. I don't need to be known as the local nut."

Samuel slammed the driver's side door of the truck and gave a little cackle of laughter as he tucked the check into his shirt pocket. "My whole damn life, this is only the third time I've made money for doing a hunting job. This is even more than your mom made for that camping-with-kids article in Woman's Day."

"We'll be millionaires before you know it."

"You know, half of this is yours, honey."

"Really?"

"Really. So what do you think – do we go look at some cars?"

"Mm," Mary said as if she were thinking it over, "just write me a check. I'll decide later."

Samuel grinned as he started the truck. "OK, Miss Moneybags."

"Could we stop at a motel?"

"You don't want to go straight home?"

She did. But she was shaky from blood loss and exhaustion, her leg hurt, and she didn't want to try to sleep sitting up in a cold jouncing truck. "I'd like to get some sleep."

He looked over at her. "Yeah, probably not a bad idea."

He threw the chupacabra corpse, net and all, into a ditch by a roadcut on an utterly dark stretch of highway and found a motel with a room to spare in Minneapolis, Kansas. Mary went to the bathroom and collapsed on the bed. Her father put his bedroll on the floor, disappeared into the bathroom himself. When he came back out and sat at the little table to make a call he kept his voice low, but he still wakened Mary, who didn't stir and didn't open her eyes.

"Hi, Deana. Yeah, we're both fine. We're gonna get a few hours sleep in Minneapolis and head home. Evil little sumbitch turned up just like Mary thought it would, gave us some exercise. She's fine. She gave it the death blow. No kidding. Born hunter. I'm bringing you home that dishwasher, well, something to pay for it anyway. I'm going to give Mary half, she earned at least that. Well, she's asleep right now, can you talk to her tomorrow? Right, I mean later this morning. We'll be in about eleven. You too." The phone clicked into its cradle.

Half of that check would put her weeks ahead in her planning. She insisted on paying her parents part of her paycheck for room and board, although her mother protested, but that did make her savings account grow slowly. It had grown, though, and with this windfall she had a decision to make.

She'd always thought she'd get a car first, which she'd need whether she was a hunter or not. Then, if she decided to run, she'd save enough money to drive across the country and get settled. But with half of the rancher's payment, she'd have enough to take a bus across the country and get settled, and, even without a car, sometimes she felt like she couldn't wait to make her escape.

"Make her escape" – she felt like a bad daughter, thinking like that. She loved her parents, and she knew their work saved lives. Still, when she was little, she'd hated it. When she'd been in her teens she'd started getting more of a kick out of being part of a secret group of warriors. But the charm of that was wearing very thin, and sometimes she couldn't wait to get away from hunting, even though she knew she was good at it. For all she knew, it was all that she was good at. What if she abandoned her parents and insulted their life's work, only to discover that she wasn't suited for anything but hunting?

One thing she knew: She had to embrace it completely or break completely away. She couldn't simply move out of the house, keep in touch, and try to set up a normal life nearby. As long as she was anywhere close to her mom and dad, she'd feel like she was betraying or endangering them if she refused when they called her for help on a hunting job. If she was going to quit hunting, she had to go without announcement, and so far away that they couldn't expect her to be with them on a moment's notice.

So. Either she was going to buy a car, stock the trunk with weaponry, and devote herself full-time to hunting. Or she was going to tell them that she was taking a weekend trip, go west, call them from the road to tell them what she was really doing, withstand her mother's tears and her father's outrage. And then –

_"I'm sorry I'm late," she gasps, dropping into her seat in the front row of the classroom. "I just got off work."_

_"Well," the professor says, handing her a few sheets of paper, "I'd be angrier if it weren't for this essay. It's one of the best I've ever seen from a student."_

_"Excuse me," another student says, "Do you mind if I sit here?"_

_Like all the people in her daydreams, he isn't visually that clear, more a feeling than a specific face. And the feeling she gets from him is wonderful. She knows he has a sweet, genuine smile. She would feel happy and safe and normal with him next to her. And for some reason, she knows he has black hair._

_"No, please have a seat," she says, gesturing at the seat next to her, and a red drop from the blood dripping off her right hand hits the chair._

_She tries to clean the blood droplet off with her left hand, but it's as gruesome as her right hand, and she's just smearing blood all over the chair. "Sorry," she says with a little laugh. "I'm a born hunter."_

She sucked in a breath and her eyes popped open. It took her some time to get back to sleep, but she didn't let herself daydream during that time.

* * *

Sitting several yards from the counter, Mary was typing a letter when Mrs. Smith, her perpetual disapproving look accented by concern, stood in front of her desk. "Mary, there's a young man asking for you. He was here the other day. Do you know him?" She gave a slight backward jerk of her head.

Mary looked over her shoulder and saw, sure enough, a young man standing at the counter. He had black hair and was wearing what looked like a brand-new denim jacket, and he was looking at the back of Mrs. Smith's head as if willing himself to see straight through her.

"No. But I answer a lot of questions on the phone, you know," she said, standing. "He probably thinks that he needs to stay in contact with the same person."

Mrs. Smith looked dubious, but let Mary pass without further comment.

She tried to disguise her slight limp as she went to the counter. She was wearing a maxi-skirt that hid the bandaging on her leg. She could see why Mrs. Smith had seemed a little concerned: The young man had a look that was intense to the point of unnerving and was standing statue-still. She smiled at him. "Hi, can I help you?"

"You're – Are you Mary Campbell?"

She had the feeling that he knew darn well she was. "Yes. Did you need help with something?"

Suddenly he smiled. It was as though he had received some inner command to do it: The corners of his mouth clicked back and his eyes widened in an instant. "Yes. Well, no. I mean, I work for Curt Bailey."

He had a nice face, really, but that forced smile was just weird. And what was he babbling about? "Yes?"

"Curt Bailey. Uh, Lawrence Used Auto?"

"Oh, yes! The calendar! Is it out yet?"

The smile dropped off his face. "Oh. I should've brought you one. Damn. Excuse me. Sorry."

"Well, no. That's OK. Did they come out all right?"

"Yes. Your picture looks great. They all do." Here came that smile again. "You know, I was talking to Curt. And he said, he thought, we might like each other."

OK, now she was starting to catch on. She just wasn't sure how happy she was about it. Vamp for time. "He did? Curt's nice. At least, I only met him a couple of times, but he seems nice."

"He's a good guy." There was a sudden genuine warmth to his smile. "Probably too soft-hearted to be a used car dealer."

She smiled back at him. "What's your name?"


	3. Two Dates

_The television show "Supernatural," including the characters John Winchester, Mary Campbell, Samuel Campbell, and Deana Campbell, is copyrighted by Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc._

"My name's John Winchester. My dad's a mechanic at the Phillips 66 on Iowa, maybe you've taken your car there?"

Mary shook her head a little. "When there's something wrong with the truck, my dad usually fixes it."

"Oh. Well, yeah. If you can fix it right yourself, that makes sense."

"So are you a mechanic, too?"

"Yes. Well, no. Not the last couple years. I mean, I'm looking for full-time work now."

"What have you been doing the last couple of years?"

He shrugged. "Oh, you know. This and that."

And suddenly she got it: The tension, as if he weren't sure who would accept him. The brand new clothing, because he'd lost weight. "This and that" for the last couple of years capped it; she'd heard it before from guys her age. "You were in Vietnam."

He met her gaze. "Yeah. So I hope you don't only go out with war protesters on principle."

"Not only." It was a mild joke, but she suddenly wanted to be serious. "I respect fighters."

"I'm glad. But I've got to tell you, you're looking at pretty much an ex-fighter and more of a mechanic here."

I like what I'm looking at. She almost said it out loud.

"So I was wondering," he cleared his throat, "would you like to get a cup of coffee? I mean, right down the street. No big deal, just, you know, talk a little."

"I think I can take a break. Can you wait a few minutes?"

"Yes, I can. Yeah. I can wait a few minutes."

Fifteen minutes later they were sitting in a coffee shop, John with black coffee on the table in front of him and Mary with lemonade.

"So," John said. "Do you live around here? Lawrence, I mean?"

"Now we do. We moved around a lot when I was little. I actually graduated from high school in Garden City."

"I was wondering why I'd never seen you before. I know I'd have remembered you."

She smiled. "We moved to town a little more than a year ago. My grandmother died and left the house to my mother. How often are you going to get a chance to move into a paid-for house?"

"Not often."

"Have you always lived in Lawrence?"

"Pretty much. We came here when I was about a year old. Dad says there weren't enough cars in Red Cloud to support a family of three."

"Red Cloud?"

"Nebraska, south central. It's about four hours from here."

"Oh." She took a sip of lemonade. "I've been to Lincoln. It's a nice town."

He smiled and nodded.

– Well, that was witty and intellectual, Mary thought. Come on, Mary. You can think of something to talk about besides killing, can't you?

"So, do you want to be a model?" John asked.

"Oh! No. That, the calendar was just a fun way to earn some extra money. But it seems like it would be a silly way to spend your whole life, worrying about whether you have a broken fingernail. And I wouldn't want to live in a huge city."

"I thought all pretty girls had a secret desire to be discovered and move to Hollywood."

She giggled. "No. Although I'm going to see Hollywood someday, do all the tourist things. And I want to walk barefoot on the beach and pick up seashells."

"Sounds like a great vacation."

"Doesn't it? Where do you want to go?"

A quick smile flicked over his face. "I used to have kind of an itchy foot, but right now I'm just glad to be home."

"I'll bet," she said quietly.

He cleared his throat. "How about non-vacation plans? Any plans for marriage, a career, anything like that?"

– Poor baby, she thought, he's trying to subtly ask me if I have a boyfriend.

In the time it took to draw a breath, she considered: If she told him no, he might turn out to be a possessive creep who felt entitled to lay claim to her. If she implied yes, he might go away and stay away. Which outcome worried her more?

"Well, none for marriage," she said. "I'm not seeing anyone right now. Career – maybe. I'm dying to go to college. But that's more because I feel ignorant. I hate that. But I've never really had, you know, a specific career in mind. If I went to college I'd take a lot of different kinds of classes but I'd probably major in something practical, so I could pay my way in the world. Do you think I'd make a good teacher?"

She was expecting an easy, "Yeah, sure," but he said, "I don't know you well enough. I don't think you're as ignorant as you say. But I think you'd probably do better if you majored in something you love, instead of just because it's practical."

"Do you love cars?"

"I do," he said in the tone of one confessing an addiction. "People think I got into it just because of my dad, and I did grow up around the work, but I think I'd love it anyway. Figuring out what makes an engine go and how to fix it, the new developments coming along. Being able to improve something with your hands and your know-how. Maybe you inherited some interest from your mom or dad that you could – Wow. No, huh?"

She hadn't realized how much her expression had changed. She put the smile back on her face. "My parents and me, we're different. My dad can't even begin to understand why I want to go to college."

"Well, you know, there's a major university about one minute from here. Would he actually mind if you took a couple of classes when you weren't working?"

No, actually, he hadn't. But she'd barely made a C in her morning biology class, where she was constantly either late or falling asleep, and her English literature teacher had questioned her so worriedly about her exhaustion and frequent injuries that she had the feeling if she'd been any younger the teacher would've called the police. "That's a good idea. I'll run it by him."

The smile stayed on John's face; it was his voice that was wistful. "He probably thinks you deserve to marry some guy rich enough that you'd never need to work."

She burst out laughing. "Well, you have to admit, that sounds pretty good."

He laughed in response. "So then you're not a women's libber," he said.

She started to give him her usual safe smiling response to that question, then she got serious. "I am, kind of. Could I just tell you the truth, how I feel about it?"

He looked a little startled. "Sure."

"It seems like everyone has to make a choice. Women, I mean. There are people who say you should be strong and independent and – fight for good causes, things like that. And there are people who say, no, you'll lose your femininity, you'll never be a wife and a good mother. My own mom – I love her very much, I do, but she and my dad are really into their work. When I was little I stayed by myself a lot – you know, they kept me fed and clothed and everything, but I wouldn't want to raise children like my mom did. But at the same time, I admire that she's independent and hard working. I just – I want to be both, you know? I'd like to be strong and fight for a good cause and be feminine and have a family all at once."

He chuckled.

"Pretty ridiculous, I know," she said, but the expression on his face had changed halfway through the sentence.

"Well, now," John said. "You're making me think of my great-aunt. She's a farmer's wife, which is never the easiest life, but when her kids were young they were farming during the Dust Bowl and the Depression. She and my great-uncle had to work like dogs, both of 'em. Their oldest son, who was going to be their main help, he was killed in World War II. I'm guessing there's not a chore on that farm, or a machine, that a man works, that she hasn't done at some time. But she's the nicest lady. She's no pushover, you know, but anyone who's around, she makes them feel like the most important person in the room. Her kids love her dearly. And she – " He closed his eyes for a moment of ecstasy – "she makes the best pies you can imagine. Peach, cherry, banana cream, any kind. So actually, yeah, I guess you can be strong and tough and be a nice lady and a wife and mother all at once."

She drew a breath while her heart gave an extra-fast couple of beats. "You're the first guy I ever heard say that."

"You're the first girl who ever made me think about it."

They talked for a few more minutes, then Mary admitted reluctantly that she had to be getting back. They walked slowly, awkwardness reasserting itself, each of them apologizing as they bumped into each other, which happened twice.

He held open the courthouse's front door for her and she paused before going in. "That was nice. Thank you."

"So, I was wondering, would you like to have dinner? Sometime?"

There went her heart again. "I'd love to."

"Um – is tomorrow too soon? I could pick you up at your house."

– Whereupon my parents can glare at you because you're not a hunter. "Oh, why don't you just meet me here Wednesday at 5:30. Would that – work out with your schedule?"

There was a flicker in his eyes, and she thought: He thinks I'm ashamed of him. But he didn't let it show other than that. "That's great. 5:30 Wednesday. I'll pick you up here. Looking forward to it."

She didn't think she moved to hold his hand; it was sort of like their hands moved together independently and clasped for a moment as they smiled into each other's eyes. Then a middle-aged lady came out through the courthouse door and cast an amused, affectionate glance at them, and their hands dropped. "I'm looking forward to it too," she said, and up the steps inside the door. When she was a few steps down the hall she half-turned, thinking it was vain to imagine that he was still watching her and yet hoping that he was.

Sure enough, he was still standing in the half-open door. He waved at her and she waved back.

* * *

Pete was screaming in pain, and John didn't know what had happened. He kept trying to help and looking for aid, but there was a fire somewhere and so much noise and confusion it was like no one could even hear Pete's screams or John's shouts.

John opened his eyes. Dark and quiet, a comfortable bed. Home.

He took a couple of breaths. His heart felt like it was beating sideways in his chest, moving over something bumpy.

After a moment he sat up, leaning his back against the wall, turned on the bedside light, wiped his damp forehead. The house was quiet, not even a light from the hallway. His dad, who went to the garage early, had gone to bed hours ago.

He took a deep breath, exhaled it out from between his lips. It had been a couple of weeks since that particular nightmare had visited. The doctor was right, they were getting less frequent. Hell, a car had backfired on the lot the other day and he hadn't had to physically stop himself from diving for cover.

Still, he doubted that he was getting any more sleep tonight. This morning. He hated to take one of those pills, he felt groggy all the next day, but he was meeting Mary at the courthouse that afternoon and he didn't want to look like something the cat dragged in.

She had a little limp. He wondered what happened – just a sprained ankle or something permanent? Not that it mattered. He just wanted to know. He wanted to know why she seemed reluctant to have him at her house. Whether she had another boyfriend – not a chance in hell that he didn't have competition for a girl like that. He wanted to know what her favorite movie was, what her bare skin would feel like if he ran his hand over it. He wanted to know everything.

He didn't have the kind of imagination that would let him create a comforting conversation out of nothing. When he predicted what someone would do, what reactions they'd have, it was because he'd paid attention to them, studied their previous actions. In the Corps once or twice he'd had people looking at him like he was a genius, when he was operating off the same information they all had, just processing it better. But he couldn't really imagine what Mary Campbell might say to him if he woke suddenly with the gray fog engulfing him that some of his dreams and memories brought. He'd only spoken to her once.

And not that he would discuss the origins of some of his nightmares with her anyway. Even if you were inclined to relive them by talking about them, which he wasn't, you sure as hell didn't burden a girl like that with stories of insane violence.

Still, just the memory of her smile cleared the bitter fog a little, gave him reason to hope for a future without it. And of course he had seen her smile often enough that he could picture it mentally. He hadn't seen that expression on her face yesterday afternoon – she'd smiled cheerfully, hesitantly, sweetly, but never with the slightly devilish impudence that marked Miss July. – What were you thinking about, Mary Campbell?

When his alarm went off he was still sitting up with the light on, sound asleep, and no further nightmares had disturbed him.

* * *

That night they went to a Mexican restaurant with a nice warm atmosphere, some college kids laughing and exclaiming a couple of booths down but not obnoxiously. He'd felt pretty high-school, having to borrow Dad's car to take a girl on a date, but he consoled himself with the thought that it wouldn't be for long.

Mary, looking very pretty (maybe a little extra makeup? Just for their date?), smiled a little mischievously at him as he sipped his beer. "If you were a tree, what kind would you be?"

John groaned plaintively. "Aah, I hate these."

"I figured you would. But if you were – "

"Oh, I don't know. Oak, I guess. How about you?"

"Sequoia," she said immediately. "They're so beautiful, or at least the pictures of them are. And they live so long. They see everything. Now you ask me one."

Plaintiveness redoubled, "Oh, I don't know. Nixon or McGovern? No, forget it. I don't know anyone who voted for McGovern."

"Mm," Mary said. "You do now."

"You're kidding."

"I really hate the war. I thought McGovern would get us out faster than Nixon."

"I thought you said you respect fighters."

"I do. I just hate fighting."

"Well." John nodded. "Not everyone makes the distinction."

"I've known a couple of guys who were over there. They said they were treated like dirt when they got back. 'Dirt' wasn't the word they used."

John grinned. "No, I don't imagine it was."

"Have you – have people – "

"I don't have much to complain about. Couple of jerks. It's – "

He hesitated, and she gave him a look that said clearly he wasn't going to have the choice of just abandoning the sentence.

"It's normal people that bother me. If people know you were in Nam, a lot of them treat you like you've got a time bomb strapped to you. It seems like almost every time I watch TV, the killer is a vet who came back ready to open fire on everyone."

"I'm sorry."

"Not your fault. I shouldn't have bothered you with it in the first place. I just don't have much of anyone else to discuss it with. Ever since my mom died, and then the country got so crazy, my dad has sort of turned his back on everything. It must have got worse after I went into the Corps, because when I got back, his whole life was going to work and watching sports on TV at home. He doesn't want to see anyone, he doesn't want to deal with the world, and he sure doesn't want to deal with my problems. Can't say I blame him."

"You're close to your dad, aren't you?"

"Well. He's an old-fashioned kind of dad, not big on emotions. But yeah, I – I want the best for him. I don't know what would happen to him if I wasn't around. I've been trying to get him to join a lodge, or maybe just have a beer with some of his old buddies sometime, but so far – " He shrugged.

She gave him an admiring smile with a dangerously tear-like shine in her eyes, and he leaped to change the subject. "OK, my turn to ask a question."

"Actually, it's my turn."

"I know, but I've been doing all the talking. Let's see. Oh yeah. What's your favorite movie?"

"I don't go to many movies. I like them, I just don't have the time. Let's see. When I was in high school I liked 'The Graduate.' I sneaked out to see it three times. Favorite – mmm. I don't know. What's your favorite?"

"Well, I'm like you. I don't get to many. I thought 'Ice Station Zebra' was great."

"OK, that's about as long ago as mine was."

"I know I've seen something since then. Let me think . . . "

Mary laughed. "We are pathetic."

"A little."

"Well. We can always start catching up now."

If ever he'd heard an opening . . . "Would you like to go to a movie after dinner? Or, this weekend?"

She smiled. "Actually, tonight would be better for me. I never really know what my weekends are going to be like."

"One of the girls at the courthouse told me that you help your dad on some kind of family business?"

"Yes. He's a handyman, free-lance. Sometimes I go with him and help out – measure things, bring stuff in from the truck, hand him tools, things like that."

"And this is at nights?"

She shrugged. "Emergencies. People call when they call."

The waiter brought their food and refilled their water glasses. Mary lifted a taco to her lips, paused, and said with a twinkle in her eye, "I should warn you, I'm a pretty messy taco eater. I may shatter your illusions about me."

"What? Oh, you mean, you don't lie around all dolled up on the hood of an Impala all day?"

"'Fraid not. Sorry." She giggled. John loved that sound. "Has Curt heard back from anyone about the calendar yet? I know he was hoping it would help him sell the cars."

John looked rueful as Mary bit into her taco and about a quarter of the contents fell onto her plate. "It'll take more than a calendar to move that Impala."

"Why? I thought it was pretty."

"It's a great looking car. But it's got some problem with the ventilation system. The damn thing gets cold the moment someone starts the engine, and it doesn't matter if they're running the heater or not. It hardly even matters if it's a sunny day."

"Really?" He didn't know why Mary was looking at him like the topic was unexpectedly interesting, but he continued, "I've been over the ventilation, the heating, the air conditioning, the electrical system – I could practically rebuild that car in the dark. Nothing seems to fix it."

"Any funny noises? Or funny smells?"

He chuckled. "A couple of people claimed it made a moaning sound, but I've never heard it."

"Really." Mary took another bite as John attacked his burrito. A moment later she said, "You know, my dad's pretty good with cars. Would you like to come over for dinner sometime this weekend? He might have run into something like that before. And it would give Mom a reason to make her pot roast."

He actually damn near told her that his own father, a professional auto mechanic, had run out of suggestions, and then mentally kicked himself. – Wake up, John! Her home! Meeting her parents! This is what's called progress!

"Sounds great. I'll tell you, at this point I'm so desperate I'd take your mom's advice on the car and eat your dad's pot roast."

That was probably a male chauvinist joke, he thought belatedly, but she laughed, so it must not have been too bad. "Friday night, then?"

"If no one's front steps fall in," he said cheerfully.

She looked a little confused.

"You know. Handyman emergencies."

She smiled. "Oh yeah. Exactly. If nothing like that happens."

They went to the re-release of "Funny Girl" after dinner, and he drove her home. The lights in the house were on – either they were night owls or waiting up for her or both. He thanked her for a great evening and she leaned forward to give him a quick, soft kiss. As she pulled back, he took her arm and pulled her to him for a longer kiss. The third kiss lasted longer, the fourth longer still, each of them clutching the other hard, John starting to lose the sense of differentiation between their bodies.

With evident reluctance, she broke away, breathing hard, and said she really had to go. He walked her up to the door and they managed one more passionate kiss before she told him she'd see him Friday at 6:30 and put her hand on the doorknob.

He was starting to get that high-school feeling again as he heard an older woman saying, "Well, that was a long dinner!" just before Mary closed the door. But it didn't matter. He walked back to his car knowing something. He didn't know exactly at what point in the evening he'd decided it; maybe he'd realized it unconsciously the first time he'd met her. But the knowledge was front and center in his consciousness now: If there was any way the world to do it, he was going to marry Mary Campbell.


	4. The Haunted Impala

_The television show "Supernatural," including the characters John Winchester, Mary Campbell, Samuel Campbell, and Deana Campbell, is copyrighted by Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc._

When the doorbell rang Mary yelled, "I'll get it!" from her room and ran downstairs to the door, speed inspired by nerves. Her parents had been almost completely silent that day as she bustled around cleaning up for John's visit. She could tell they thought she was serious about this non-hunter who was a stranger to them, and she couldn't very well tell them that she wasn't sure she was going to be in town long enough to get serious about anyone. She kept repeating that to herself, though. She didn't know why.

When she opened the door a gust of cold wind came in with John. He was wearing an old gray coat that was too tight across the shoulders and an air of quiet determination. "Oh, come in quick!" she chirped, then cleared her throat and readjust her voice down a half-octave. "Let me take your coat. Dad's in the dining room."

"Am I late?" he asked as she hung his coat in the hall closet. He glanced through the living room, which led directly to the dining room where Samuel was sitting at the table, leaning back a little, ostensibly reading the newspaper.

She rolled her eyes and spoke quietly. "No. He just likes to be the lion of the dining table."

John grinned. "OK."

She led John into the dining room, speaking as she moved. "Dad? This is John Winchester. John, this is my dad, Samuel Campbell."

Samuel lowered his paper a little and looked up at John with no very great favor.

"It's a pleasure to meet you, sir." John stuck his hand more than halfway across the table, almost challenging Samuel to be churlish enough to refuse it, and gave him a friendly smile. "I really appreciate your taking the time to help me with this car. It's got me stumped."

Sam dropped one corner of the paper and shook hands with John. "Well. Hope I can help."

"You must be John." Deana Campbell, a trim, short-haired woman wearing a tea towel doubled and tied around her waist in lieu of an apron to protect her skirt, came out of the kitchen bearing a tray with four glasses of water. "It's nice to meet you." She put the tray down and handed a glass to John. "Have a glass of water. I really don't think people drink enough of it."

"Yeah, that's her little fixation now," Samuel said with a grin, taking a glass from the tray himself. "She read it in a woman's magazine somewhere and now we might as well have an irrigator running across the dining room."

Turning her head, Mary fixed her mother with a death-ray look which Deana met with a placid smile as she handed Mary a glass. John's glass, of course, would have come from the pitcher in the refrigerator into which Deana dropped a sterling-silver crucifix every morning, murmuring a Latin incantation as she did. Her dad was watching John sharply, although he didn't need to; the reaction of a demon who drank holy water wouldn't be subtle at all. It would be like he'd just swallowed battery acid.

– And my parents think I'm so stupid that I wouldn't know –

John took a polite sip of water, smiled at Deana, and then the expression on his face changed.

Then he lifted the glass again and chugged the remainder.

"Wow," he said to Deana. "I must've been thirstier than I thought. Maybe you're right."

"You see?" Mary said meaningfully to her father.

"You keep it in the refrigerator, but don't serve it with ice," Deana said. "That way it's extra-refreshing. Well, have a seat, John. Mary, do you want to help me bring things out?"

Mary followed her mother into the kitchen silently. She smiled a little at the humor of what had just happened, but she was stung by it too. She grabbed a carving knife and fork before her mother could, thinking that slicing the tender meat would give her an outlet for the anger she knew she shouldn't feel. Deana dished tossed salad quietly into four bowls.

" – a lot less run-down," John was saying when they returned. "Of course, it'll look better when those trees get a little bigger and leaf out."

"Are you talking about the downtown redevelopment?" Deana asked. "It turned out really well, didn't it?" She put a bowl of carrots and onions and potato chunks that the meat had cooked in on the table, and Mary followed with the meat platter.

John leaned forward to inhale deeply. "Now that smells great."

"Doesn't it?" Samuel said. "She's been having to defend the kitchen from me for the last two hours."

John chuckled.

My God, we're good at pretending to be normal, Mary thought.

"Now let's see," Deana said. "John, do you want a beer?"

"No, thanks, ma'am. I'll take a refill on the water, though."

"I'll take a beer," Samuel said.

"Now that surprises me," Deana said in an unsurprised tone. "Let's see – what else?"

"Ketchup," John and Samuel said in perfect unison, although John made it a question.

Deana laughed. "Of course. Mary, you sit down now. I'll get the rest."

"So you're a part-time mechanic," Samuel said as Mary sat, taking great pains over arranging her napkin.

"Soon to be full-time, I hope. Actually, my goal is to own my own garage."

"Call your own shots, eh? Lot of work being self-employed."

"Yes, sir. I'm putting together a plan so hopefully I won't get overwhelmed anywhere along the way."

"Going to stay in town?"

"I want to. My dad's here. And frankly, I can't think of a better place to live. Enough stores and businesses that you don't have to drive an hour to get anything, but not so over-crowded that . . . "

– He's trying so hard, Mary thought. I should make more of an effort too. I just didn't realize how pathetic it would feel, playing normal American family, when the whole time I know the only reason they let me invite him is that he has a job for us that he doesn't even know about.

" – brother, Mary," John was saying.

She looked blankly at him, then laughed. "I'm sorry, I was daydreaming. What?"

"I said I didn't know you had a brother who moved to Chicago. I guess some people really do like big cities."

"Some people really like fast living," Samuel said dourly. "I just hope he has the sense to move someplace smaller when they start having children. Big city like that is no place for kids to play outside, or walk to school."

"Well, not until they're 11, anyway," Mary said quietly. "Then Roger can teach them how to handle a rifle and guard the house when their parents are gone."

There was a marked silence.

John soldiered on. "Well, there's something to be said for big cities. Chicago's a great town. I guess it's just personal preference."

"Besides, Samuel, you make it sound like he's drinking and going to wild parties," Deana said, with a quick glance between her daughter and her husband. "There are more museums and pro sports teams and interesting things to do in Chicago than here. I wouldn't call that 'fast living.'"

"You know what the ideal would be?" Mary wanted to atone for her sharpness, and thank goodness she had a topic in the forefront of her mind. "The ideal would be a small or a mid-sized town, like Lawrence or maybe larger, with farm country around it, but you could easily get to castles and deserts and museums right from it."

She cast a quick smile at her father, who wasn't ready to smile back yet, and then noticed that John was looking at her as if he'd made a wonderful new discovery about her. She liked the look, but didn't know why she'd earned it.

"There are good museums up on campus," Deana said. "Have you ever been to the Natural History Museum, John?"

"Not since my sixth-grade field trip. You know what they say: If it's in your own hometown, you never get to it."

There was a round of chuckles and a moment of silent eating.

"So, John," Samuel said, and then with emphasis, "Mary asked me to talk to you about this car of yours."

"Actually, it's not mine, it's the company's, so if you have any ideas, Curt Bailey and I would both really appreciate it. It seems to be a temperature control issue, but I can't tell – "

The next half-hour was pretty technical, as Samuel and John discussed the Impala, along with way swapping stories of weird automotive maladies they'd run across. The four finished dinner, and Deana shooed the men into the living room with the promise of pie and coffee in a few minutes.

Mary began carrying dishes into the kitchen while Deana spread out a newspaper and began scraping the unusable orts onto it. "John seems nice."

"He is nice."

"Could you see – not right now, of course, but could you see, sometime in the future, discussing hunting with him?"

"Absolutely not," Mary said, fast and flatly.

Deana sighed. "That's part of what you like about him. That he's not a hunter."

"Part of it, yes."

"I know that – "

Deana's voice quivered a little and Mary stopped moving around the kitchen to look at her.

"I know that you and Roger both think you were cheated out of your childhoods. That's why he moved away. That's why he's so angry that he and his wife won't even come back for Thanksgiving."

"Well – no, Mom, I don't think he's that angry. Any more. I think he just doesn't want to put Debbie at risk by coming here."

"People are at risk all the time." Deana took a breath. "I've told you how your father and I met."

She had; only once. Mary had been a child, and even so she had realized that the memory caused her mother so much pain that Mary had never pressed her for details. "A werewolf killed your brother. Dad came into town and killed it."

"Yes. But I never told you that I was there."

"You were there when Dad killed the werewolf?"

"No. I was there when it killed Tommy."

Mary swallowed. "No. You never told us that."

"I can't bear to think about it. Not just – not just what happened, but what I did. What I didn't do."

"What – "

"We were taking a shortcut home." Deana moved closer to Mary and lowered her voice. "Through a park. Not even a big park, just a few blocks, but there were a lot of trees. I was angry at my parents for making me walk my little brother home from the movies instead of letting me stay out later with my friends. Tommy ran on ahead, and I let him."

There was a pause. Deana looked as though she were concentrating.

"I heard him scream. I ran ahead. There was – I couldn't tell if it was – a man or some kind of animal standing on its hind legs. It was holding Tommy in the air, by his throat. Tommy saw me. He couldn't scream by then. He said, 'Deeny.' That was what he used to call me when he was learning – "

Her voice broke. She took a breath.

"When he was just learning to talk. The thing squeezed, with its claw, Tommy made the most awful – the most awful sound."

"Mom, please – you don't have to – "

"Yes, I do. There's a reason." Deana looked at her. "What I'm saying is – I did nothing. I stood there, I couldn't believe it. It was like a nightmare, like watching a horror movie. It couldn't be happening. I had no idea what to do, how to – I stood and watched while the thing tore his throat and – ripped open his chest – "

Her calm snapped, a sharp loud sob escaped her. She leaned against the counter as though it was the only way to keep from falling. Mary grabbed her. "Mom, please. Please don't. Why are you torturing yourself?"

"Because I need you to understand." Deana took Mary's arm and looked her in the eye. "I never. Never. Ever. Want you to feel the way I did then. So completely helpless. Knowing that someone you love died because you stood there staring and did nothing."

"Mom. He died because a werewolf attacked him. There was nothing you could have done. It wasn't your fault."

"Your father's been trying to convince me of that for more than twenty years. Sometimes I believe him."

Mary felt tears in her eyes. "I'm sorry."

"But that won't happen to you. I'm not saying nothing bad will ever happen. We both know. There are monsters. And there are diseases and drunk drivers and – Bad things can happen. But you won't, neither you or Roger, you won't just stand there. You won't just watch it and do nothing. You'll know. You'll know."

Mary put her arms around her mother and for just a moment Deana wept on Mary's shoulder. Then she straightened and pulled gently away, wiping her eyes. "Well. I've kept you out here long enough. You go talk with John and your father. No, I mean it. Tell them I'll be out soon with the coffee."

"And the pie." Mary moved to the kitchen door and tried to make it sound like their whole conversation had been this light. "Don't forget the pie!"

She gave a little laugh, paused in a nook of the dining room to wipe her own eyes, and went on through to the living room.

"Only two people, that I know of," John was saying.

Her father was sitting in his worn easy chair and John was sitting on the side of the sofa nearest him. Mary settled beside John, who smiled at her quickly and then turned back to watch Samuel, so that Mary was seeing her father around the back of John's head.

"Who were they?" Samuel asked John.

John looked puzzled.

"It can make a difference. Different driving styles. If you know who heard the car make a sound, you might to able to figure out what they were doing and get to the root of it."

"It's a good thought. Unfortunately, I really don't know. One of them was a previous owner who only had the car for a week and brought it back. The other was a, uh, former employee of the car lot."

Mary saw her father's eyes sharpen at John's slight hesitation. "You didn't like him?"

"I never knew him. He, well, apparently Curt feels he may have been dishonest. With company funds."

Samuel lifted his gaze quickly to meet Mary's eyes, and she nodded her head very slightly.

"So," John finished, "it would probably be awkward to tell Curt to call him and ask about his driving style."

"Yeah, just a little. I'll tell you, John, you've done everything I could think of in your place. Let me chew it over for a day or two, maybe I'll think of something."

"I appreciated the discussion. And I really appreciated the pot roast."

"Which reminds me, where's that coffee? I'm going to go help Deana with that."

Samuel rose and Mary let him go a step or two before saying, "Oh, Dad, don't be silly, that's my job!" and following him out. She did remember to look back at their guest and say, "We'll be right back!" before joining Samuel and Deana in the kitchen.

Deana was putting daubs of Cool Whip on slices of cherry pie, and the percolator was filling the kitchen with the scent of fresh-brewed coffee. Samuel was getting coffee cups and saucers out of the cupboard. "What do you think?" Mary asked him.

"Well, I think you're right. It's a spirit, and that car will be haunted until we find the body of whoever's haunting it and burn the bones. Good thing you had such a lousy childhood, or you never would've known."

"I'm sorry," Mary said.

"Now, Samuel." Deana showed no signs of her earlier emotion except a slight pinkness around her eyes. "I went through that with her just now. Let's move along."

"Hm," Samuel said. "Well, anyway, you were right."

"But do you think it's worth it?" Mary asked. "I've been thinking about it. When you balance the risk of getting caught burning a corpse against the fact that all the spirit does is make the car hard to sell – "

"Someone'll buy it eventually. And these things accelerate. It probably made the car cold before it started moaning – next thing you know, it's steering the car into the Kaw. Best to get rid of it while it's still just a nuisance."

"Interesting that only two people have heard the moaning," Mary said.

"And that one of them was probably a crook," her father replied. "So, maybe, a cop who died during a crime the car was involved in."

"Or maybe a criminal trying to warn people against a life of crime," Deana said, handing two saucers of pie to Mary. "Now our company's been sitting out there by himself long enough."

"We'll need the VIN," Samuel said to Mary, heft a tray of coffee cups.

"I'll go out and get it tonight after John leaves."

"Need any help?"

"To get into a car? Please."

* * *

It's like I have a split personality.

Late that night, actually early the next morning, Mary lay flat on her bed. The late-night cold still seemed to cling to the jeans and dark jacket she'd changed into before going to Lawrence Used Auto. The Impala's VIN was written in a small notebook that lay by her bed.

– One moment I practically want to brag to the world about what great hunters my parents are – heck, I practically want to brag about myself. And the next, I wish I'd never heard of it and certainly would never bring up my children that way.

She understood what her mother had been saying earlier. But the price for bringing up children prepared to act at any danger was teaching your children that the world is a horrible, dangerous place. Of course, some children do grow up in threatening places, their parents have no choice but to teach them that. But if you have a choice –

Deana hadn't felt that she had a choice. But Mary did.

Didn't she?

And wasn't she jumping the gun? What children? Never mind children, what husband? Who would want to marry into this freak show?

John?

Talk about jumping the gun. They'd had three dates. If he knew she was thinking about marriage and children in connection with him, he'd run screaming.

Of course, he had good reason to run anyway. And she couldn't bear that thought. To fall more deeply in love with him, to be close enough to tell them the truth, and then to have the whole thing end because of that –

Maybe it was easier to end it now, before she had to face that heartbreak. Keep doing what she'd been born to do, what she knew she was good at.

What about her escape plan? The escape to a life that she had no idea how to live? Better to do that now, before she ran the risk of breaking John's heart? Or she could ask him to fly with her, to tear up the roots he was just beginning to re-establish. And again, if she got close enough to him to ask him to join her, she'd have to tell him about herself, and it might all be –

She suddenly realized how hard she was clutching the bedspread and how fast she was breathing.

– Calm down. It's all right. I can't do anything for a couple of weeks anyway, I'm certainly not going to leave Mom and Dad with no other family at Thanksgiving. For that matter, I ought to stay at least through Christmas. Maybe by that time I'll have decided exactly how I feel about hunting. Or John. Or the plan. Calm down.

She lay in the dark, trying to relax her muscles, to breathe normally, to fall asleep.


	5. Burning Bones

_The television show "Supernatural," including the characters John Winchester, Mary Campbell, Samuel Campbell, and Deana Campbell, is copyrighted by Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc._

One of the main advantages of working at the courthouse was access to records. Even thought the Register of Deeds office had nothing to do with car ownership, it was easy enough for Mary to find the right numbers and drop the right names so that, armed with the Impala's VIN, she could call Topeka and use minimal lying to attain a complete history of the car's ownership.

On Monday night she went to the library to look through newspaper clip files, and hit pay dirt with the first name.

There were three clippings in the small yellow envelope with "Wilson, Thomas N." typed on it. The first very briefly recounted the accountant's arrest for embezzling from his employer, Middle West Manufacturing. The second, larger and with a picture, was headlined, "Alleged Embezzler Dies / In Apparent Suicide."

She raised her eyebrows at the word "apparent," but as she read over the story she realized that this was journalistic punctilio; it was obviously suicide. His co-workers and a neighbor gave the usual expressions of shock; he'd been one of the youngest ever to hold his job at the company, and people couldn't understand why he'd done it. An anonymous acquaintance said that Tom liked to live a flashy life, wearing expensive suits, meeting groups of co-workers for dinner and insisting on taking the check, bedecking his wife with diamonds.

And yet, on the day he died in mid-1970, Mary knew, he'd still owned a car he'd bought in 1966. Either the acquaintance was exaggerating, or Wilson's flashiness hadn't extended to buying a new car every year or two, or he'd loved that car even more than he loved showing off new possessions. She was willing to bet she knew which one it was.

The third clipping was an obituary. She was a little surprised; maybe his widow had been desperately trying for normalcy, trying to deny the shame in the way her husband had died. It was very short, simply listing survivors (his wife and a brother), saying that services would be private, and giving the place of interment – Maple Grove Cemetery in Lawrence.

– Thank goodness. If he'd been cremated or shipped to another country for burial, I don't know what I'd have done.

The Impala had been sold to a dealership less than a month after Wilson's death. The second individual owner had bought it from the dealership within a couple of weeks and held onto it until mid-1971, selling it to a Miami County dealership. The third individual owner had kept it until early '72, selling it directly to the fourth individual owner, who had sold it to Lawrence Used Auto in June of '72. There was only one clip file related to any of these owners, a feature article about the first Miami County owner, who consistently won livestock prizes at the American Royal exposition in Kansas City.

Then came the owner who had bought the car from Lawrence Used Auto just this past summer and sold it back to the company a week later – complaining, according to John, about a moaning noise. His name was Ned Merkerson, and he'd made quite a splash in 1965, or at least his trial for mail fraud had. He'd been sentenced to five years in prison. Mary wondered if Tom's spirit moaned at everyone who had ever done anything crooked, or if Tom knew something about Ned's current activities that would interest the police.

So it looked like her mother had been right: Tom Wilson, having killed himself rather than face trial and punishment, clung in spirit to the car he'd loved – maybe had started stealing to buy? – creating a mobile cold spot for every owner and desperately moaning a warning or a threat to those who were themselves thieves. And it looked like her dad was right, too: The spirit's activities were accelerating in intensity. Each successive owner had driven the car for a shorter period of time before getting rid of it. Given that Tom had killed himself by jumping off the Massachusetts Street Bridge, Samuel's remark about the spirit steering the car into the Kansas River was scarily accurate. Yes, bones needed to be burned.

John sent a thank-you note to Samuel and Deana that arrived on Monday, and Tuesday he called Mary. She sat by the side table in the dining room where the telephone was and turned her back on the living room, where her parents were going over a map of Maple Grove Cemetery supplied by a fellow hunter.

"You're good luck for me, no two ways about it." John's voice was warm and enthusiastic over the phone.

She laughed, hoping it didn't come out bitter sounding. "Well, I've never heard that before. What happened?"

"I told you that my dad has practically turned into a recluse since my mom died, how it's been worrying me. He just told me today, he's actually going to drive to Jefferson City on Friday and spend a couple of days with my uncle!"

"John, that's wonderful!"

"It's amazing. This is my mom's brother, and ever since Mom died, Dad hasn't been able to bear talking to her family. It's like they're just a reminder that Mom's gone. But they've been trying to stay in touch. Over the weekend they called to ask Dad if we'd come over for Thanksgiving, and he said he'd rather spend the holiday at home but he'd be glad to come on Friday."

"Isn't it lovely? When things normalize? Are you going with him?"

"No, but that's the second piece of good luck. I talked to a guy who owns a garage in DeSoto, he thinks he's going to need a new mechanic. He's finalizing his 1973 budget this weekend, and if he can afford it he's going to hire me in January. He said he'd call Friday or Saturday to let me know, so I'm going to be sticking by the phone here."

"I don't know whether I should say you're a shoo-in or not. I'm afraid to jinx it."

"You could never jinx anything. Everything's been better for me since I met you."

She closed her eyes. In the background she could hear her father saying, " – load up on salt and lighter fluid, nothing'll be open on Thursday – "

"Well, you never know about people," she said.

"Are you OK?"

"Yes. Just tired."

"I was going to ask if you wanted to go out tomorrow, but if you're tired – "

"I'd better not. We're having family friends over Thanksgiving weekend, and after work I should really help Mom get everything ready."

"That's the only good thing about being two cranky old bachelors. Nobody to impress."

She laughed.

"So I won't have a car on Friday – I'm telling you, if this guy hires me, first thing I do is buy a car. But if you'd like to slip away from the family friends on Saturday night, Dad'll be back then."

"I'd love to. Thanks."

"Yeah, you kind of sounded like you could use an escape hatch. Dinner?"

"Mm – I'm not sure what the plans are. I'll call you Friday and we'll work it out."

"Sounds good. Two calls to look forward to."

"I've got to go. I – " she stumbled verbally – "I hope you get the job."

"Thanks. I'll let you know as soon as I know."

"Well. I'll talk to you Friday."

"Looking forward to it. Goodbye."

"'Bye." She hung up and took a deep breath.

She had almost said "I love you" to John. The words just seemed natural.

But nothing else about her was natural. And until she knew how to deal with that, she was going to keep the relationship with John as close to merely friendly as she could.

Even if his kissing was like a short-cut to Heaven.

* * *

"Samuel Campbell, you bald old bastard!"

Even if she hadn't been right upstairs, even if she hadn't been expecting him, Mary would have recognized Dirk Lyons' booming voice. Mr. Lyons was one of Samuel's oldest friends, and when she was little she'd wondered if he could literally rattle a windowpane. Lyons' bellow, however, wasn't what Mary was dreading as she stepped into her high heels and went downstairs.

Dirk's daughter, a black-haired girl giving Samuel an enthusiastic hug, looked over at Mary and cooed, "Awwww – isn't she cute in her little pink dress!"

That was what she was dreading.

"Hello, Val," Mary said politely. "Hi, Mr. Lyons. It's good to see you both."

"You know, you're the same age as Val, Mary," Lyons said.

Mary was baffled. "Um – yes – "

Lyons laughed and clapped her on the arm. "I mean you're an adult now, Mary! Call me Dirk!"

"Oh, all right. I guess it has been a couple of years, hasn't it? Can I take your coat?"

"Sure thing, Mary, thanks. How did she ever get such good manners being your daughter?"

"From her mother," Samuel said with a grin, sitting in his easy chair.

"Of course she did. Where is Deana?"

Holding Lyons' coat, Mary turned to Val, who indicated that she wanted to keep her black denim jacket by wrinkling her nose and flicking her fingers at Mary.

"She's in the kitchen," Samuel said. "She'll be out in a moment."

"Or I'll be in, in a moment," Dirk said cheerfully, heading for the kitchen. "Deana? Where are you? Fussing with a turkey?"

"So Sam," Val said, dropping down on the sofa where John had sat the other day. "Tell me about the Stilwell poltergeist."

"Nasty thing. Throwing knives, dropping radios into bathtubs. Sent members of the family to the emergency room five or six times."

"I'll bet. What did you do? Mojo bags?"

"Believe it or not, mojo bags weren't strong enough. Deana finally came up with the idea of adopting the Latin exorcism ritual for a building. We went through and purified it room by room."

"No shit. What did the poltergeist do?"

"Tried to kill us," Samuel said simply. "We cleared as many knives and heavy objects out of the rooms as we could, but you can't get rid of everything. So Deana and I are standing in a salt circle, everything from furniture to books flying at us like we're in the middle of a tornado, Deana reading Latin and throwing holy water, me slamming down flying crap with a shotgun and shooting rock salt occasionally – it was interesting."

Val laughed. "Yeah, I love those 'interesting' cases. So Mary wasn't there?"

"When it's possible, we like to leave one of us at home," Samuel said.

"I was tracking a chupacabra," Mary said.

Val looked at her as though this were unexpectedly impressive. "Good for you!" She turned back to Sam. "I hunted a chupe once out near Moberly. Dad was down in New Orleans and I was sitting in a motel room bored to death, and I saw a story on the local news – "

"You hunted it by yourself?" Samuel's tone was a cross between disapproving and admiring.

"Nothing else to do. All the guys in town were ugly."

Samuel chuckled.

"It kept hitting this one dairy farmer, so I put a good heavy log out in the field and covered it with industrial adhesive, with blood over that."

"The adhesive didn't harden before the chupe got there?"

"Kept a bucket of blood warm and kept ladling it on. It turned up before too long, anyway. It managed to get unstuck from the log, but only after I stuck a long blade down its throat. It left a foot behind on the log, too. Slowed it up enough that I was able to get in a couple of belly shots." She pushed up the sleeve of her jacket and showed a nasty-looking twist of white scar tissue on her arm. "It gave me that in return."

Samuel shook his head, grinning. "I'll be damned. What's next? You gonna take on a demon by yourself?"

There was the sound of a crash in the kitchen, brief outcries from both Deana and Dirk, then Deana's voice laughingly saying, "Go on now, shoo!"

Dirk lumbered through the dining room looking repentantly at the three in the living room. "OK, I'm supposed to leave the kitchen now and send in the girls."

Deana was getting a broom and dustpan out of a narrow closet when Mary and Val walked into the kitchen; a broken glass relish dish, its shards commingled with pieces of carrot, celery and cauliflower, lay on the floor. "Mary, would you sweep this up? I'm going to start cutting up some more vegetables."

Val slid smoothly between Mary and her mother, taking the broom. "I'll clean up. Mary, you do the Susie Homemaker stuff, you're good at it. Besides, my dad made the mess."

"I swear, Valerie," Deana said, "if I hadn't seen your father stalking prey, I'd never believe he could be that stealthy."

"Pretty amazing, isn't it?" Val set the broom aside, crouched, and began tossing chunks of broken glass into her opened left palm. "One time a bartender told me he was about ready to offer Dad a deal – he'd give Dad his drinks for free if Dad would pay for all the glasses he broke."

Deana laughed. Mary, standing at the counter cutting up crudités, laughed too, but since she was having to stand with her back to the other two she doubted if they even noticed.

"Where are you two living now?" Deana asked.

"We were in Valentine, but we're on our way south. Way too cold up there. Plus I hear tell there's a sasquatch in a forest in southeastern Oklahoma."

"Are you going to hunt it? They don't harm humans."

"No, I just want to observe it so I can know what I'm dealing with in case any of 'em ever does turn nasty. Plus, talk about great stalking practice."

"True. You know it's at least a two-month project. You have to virtually disappear into the woods, eat what grows or lives there, essentially become a forest creature yourself."

"Beats waiting tables all day and packing bullets all night. Don't you think?"

"I suppose," Deana said. "Your dad will miss you."

"Oh, it'll go by in no time. And we're going to set up a system where I can check for messages in case of emergencies."

"Well, I admire you for undertaking it."

"So Mary," Val said, "what've you got planned for the winter?"

– Let's see. Flee hunting entirely or embrace it completely. Haven't decided yet. "Oh, I – I don't really know."

"Hey, Deana, you remember the year we were living in that piss-poor town in Minnesota, Mary and me were in high school, and we wound up hunting a troll over Christmas break? Now that's the way to spend a winter day. Too bad you didn't come with us, Mary. What was it, you were baking cookies or something?"

"I never did figure out how a troll wound up in America," Deana said. "To me that was the interesting part."

"Oh, yes, I remember. It was Thanksgiving break, not Christmas." Mary's voice was cool and clear; her gaze remained on the cutting board. "The school was having a bake sale right after the break to raise money for student government and since they elected me sophomore class treasurer, I felt like I had to help out. It's the kind of thing that happens when you have friends."

Then for a moment there was only the sound of Mary's knife chopping.

"Val, would you tell the men to wash up and come on in to the dining room?" Deana asked. "Mary and I will start putting out the food."

"Got it. Mind if I grab a beer?" There was the sound of the refrigerator door opening and closing, and Val left.

"That wasn't necessary, Mary." Deana's voice was quiet and deeply disapproving.

Mary turned to face her. "OK. She makes fun of my clothes, calls me Susie Homemaker, implies every way she can that I'm a lousy hunter, but I'm supposed to be careful of her feelings."

"She's a sad person, desperate for attention, and she grew up without a mother. I'm not saying you have to love her. I'm saying you need to grow a thicker hide." With which, Deana picked up a bowl of mashed potatoes and went into the dining room.

Dinner, as not infrequently happens when the diners are all hunters, quickly became a succession of can-you-top-this tales, each story upping the last in violence, gross-out quotient or both. Mary took the rare step of having a beer herself (although she drank hers from a glass), and felt herself relaxing into it, making a gory joke at one point that won a guffaw from Dirk Lyons and a grin from her father.

"All right," Samuel said after a final round of compliments had been paid to Deana and Mary for the dinner. "Mary and I have a little job, we figured there'd be almost no traffic and security at the cemetery would be light tonight. If either of you want to join us that'd be great, or if you want to just relax here it shouldn't take us more than a few hours."

"Cemetery?" Val said. "Burning bones?"

"More than bones. The guy just died two years ago."

"Wow," Val said. "You sure you want to come, Mary? You're likely to need a barf bag."

"It's my job," Mary said quietly.

"Sure enough," Samuel said to both Lyonses, "Mary figured out this guy's haunting a 1967 Chevy Impala."

"Well, you gotta admire his taste," Dirk said. "Sure, I'll come. The more hands digging, the sooner we all get back."

"You're just trying to duck out on clean-up detail," Val ribbed her father.

"How about you, Val?" Samuel asked. "You coming?"

"Couldn't keep me away."

"I'll have pumpkin pie and coffee ready when you all get back," Deana said, rising. "And of course bail money if you need it."

It didn't look likely that bail money would be needed; Samuel had chosen his night well. As they drove the narrow residential roads near the cemetery, Samuel had to guide the truck carefully between cars of people visiting their relatives that lined both sides of the street, but they passed only a few cars that were actually being driven. As they broke into the cemetery they of course kept a lookout for security, but found no cause for concern. Fortunately, Tom Wilson was buried near the middle of the graveyard, well removed from the street, about halfway down a hill that was topped with the oldest and most massive stone monuments.

Wilson's marker was a simple stone slab, set level with the ground, reading, "Thomas N. Wilson / Beloved Husband / 1937-1970."

The task was grueling even before the burning started. You can't just break through the top of a modern coffin the way you can through the flimsy pine box of an 1870s gunslinger, so the hole has to be wide enough to allow someone to go down into it and use acid and/or a crowbar to get the thing open, and, of course, has to be wide enough to allow the lid to remain open. It had been cold for weeks and the ground was hard. Even with all four of them digging, each father-daughter team digging while the prior team rested and kept a lookout, it took hours.

At long last, however, Dirk helped Samuel out of the excavation, and Tom Wilson's coffin lay open under the bleak light of their blackout lanterns and flashlights.

All four of the hunters were exhausted and filthy, breathing heavily. Mary's attempt to put her hair in order with her blistered hands was met by Val's jeering inquiry as to whether Mary would like some lipstick, a little eyeliner?

The men poured salt over the corpse. Val, who said she liked the smell of lighter fluid, sprayed the corpse liberally. Mary was given the honor of lighting a matchbook and tossing it into the coffin.

There was a small explosion as flame met lighter fluid, then fed off fabric, flesh, and embalming fluid. A noxious cloud poured up around the boiling cauldron of flame. Mary backed away from the smell; Val grinned at Mary and stayed her ground. There was a moment's silence except for the sound of burning.

"Do you think – " Mary began.

Val banged into her, lurching away from the coffin, fell to her knees and retched violently, several times.

As undeniably as the fire leaping out of the coffin, Mary felt an almost hysterical laughter bubble out of her gut and through her throat. "Hey, there, Val," she said to the woman whose body was still convulsing, "sure you don't need a barf bag?"

She turned back and looked across the hole in the ground at the other two. Dirk was already moving toward his daughter. Samuel looked back at Mary expressionlessly, without humor, without anger, and yet the look dashed the smile from her face.

Behind her she could hear Val saying to Dirk in garbled fury, " – fine! Leave me alone!"

For God's sake, Dad, Mary thought. Talk about needing to grow a thicker hide. She's been riding me all night. Hell, she's been riding me since our families started crossing paths. She can dish it out, she can damn well figure out how to take it. You want a soldier who can burn corpses and slaughter chupes, you've got one, but you can't ask a soldier to be all understanding and polite –

John Winchester.

She felt him that suddenly, his presence as clear as if he'd tapped her shoulder, his quiet weary intensity, the gentleman extending his hand to her glaring father, the hopeful lover gazing at his calendar girl.

She was almost sick herself.

It required a second round of salt and flame to get the bones as burned as they needed to be. Using their shovels, Samuel and Dirk pushed what remained of the coffin lid closed and all four hurriedly re-filled the hole, not so much to disguise that anything had happened as to prevent anyone from falling into it. Val perked up during the process, although she didn't actually insult Mary again for twenty minutes or so. Dirk and Samuel reminisced in the truck going back, while Val tipped her head back and seemed to doze and Mary sat staring at her hands folded in her lap.

She begged off pumpkin pie, pleading exhaustion, when they got back. She went upstairs and thoroughly washed her hands, arms and face in the bathroom without once looking in the mirror. In her bedroom she had begun undressing when she stopped suddenly, sat on the bed and covered her face with her hands.

Not that it made any difference. The vision was inside her head: Herself turning to laugh and jeer at a girl who was on the ground vomiting helplessly.

Of course, Val was crass, and of course, Val had been deliberately provoking Mary all night. That wasn't the point. Val didn't pretend to be anything other than what she was. Val didn't claim to hate hunting one day and insist on her hunting prowess being respected the next. Val wasn't so two-faced that she tried to be one thing around her family and another around her boyfriend. Val wasn't becoming an increasingly unpleasant hypocrite.

She took her hands from her face, folded them on her lap and stared straight ahead.

So, the decision was made, had almost been made for her.

– Somehow, Mom and Dad can be hunters without turning cruel. I admire it, but I can't do it. I don't like what hunting does to me when I embrace it, and when I don't embrace it I'm miserable doing it. I can't be anywhere around it. Not for awhile, anyway. I can't just move somewhere else in town, or even to Kansas City, and have the strength of will to tell my parents no when they call for help. No, I'm going with my original plan. And I'm going tomorrow.

And John?

She felt like someone had hollowed out her heart when she thought that she might never see him again.

But he deserved better than her. And if he didn't believe that, then it was a good thing she was leaving now, before he knew her better.

She got ready for bed without further pondering or further emotion. She needed to try to get some sleep. She was going to have a long day tomorrow.


	6. The Runner

_The television show "Supernatural," including the characters John Winchester, Mary Campbell, Samuel Campbell, and Deana Campbell, is copyrighted by Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc._

John had just hung up the phone and was turning to the refrigerator door when the phone rang again. He popped the receiver off the wall with his left hand and tossed it into his right hand just for fun. "Winchester residence."

"John?"

"Mary! Perfect timing. I just got off the phone telling Dad the great news."

"What?"

"I got the job! I start January 2nd. Good pay, full-time, working with a lot of different makes and models, a chance to learn the business side, everything I wanted."

"You deserve it, John. I'm so glad for you."

"I'm gonna call Curt – what time is it?"

"About 4:40."

"Yeah, he'll be busy trying to wrap up the day's paperwork, they're closing at 5:30. I'll call him at home tonight."

"He'll be sorry to see you go."

"Well, he's got about five weeks to find someone else, so I won't be leaving him in the lurch too much. How was your Thanksgiving?"

A pause. "It was OK. How was yours?"

"Just fine, you know, quiet. Dad left this morning for Uncle Bill's house. He got there in time for lunch and they had cold turkey sandwiches, one of his favorite things."

"One of mine, too."

"So speaking of food – dinner tomorrow night?"

The sound of a choked sob brought him right back to earth.

"Mary? What's wrong?"

A deep breath on the other end of the line. "I'm leaving town."

"Leaving – where?"

"I'm moving someplace else. I'm not – I'm not telling anyone."

"Why? Mary, what happened?"

She cleared her throat. "Nothing. Well. I got – I got a look inside myself. It's nothing good, John. It's no one you'd want to be with."

"That's ridiculous." He was so astonished and baffled that his voice went clear through to the other side and sounded utterly cool.

"No. I wish it were. I wish I could explain this to you, but I can't."

"Mary, tell me what happened. I can help you."

"No, you can't. Truly. This is entirely my problem. I have to get away from my family, from – everything."

"But – but you can't – "

– Great, he thought, sputtering. That'll help.

"Think about this, Mary. Whatever your situation is, can it be worse than going somewhere unknown, no family or friends, no money, no job? You're going to make – whatever it is, ten times worse."

"How do you know?" He could imagine her face as she said it, a trace of a smile beneath sad eyes. "Maybe I have lots of friends there."

"Well – do you? I'd be less worried."

"Don't worry, John. This is something I've been thinking about for awhile. I've been saving money, I emptied out my account this afternoon. I know where I'm going. I don't know exactly what I'll do there, but it's a growing city, there'll be jobs. I'll be fine."

"If you just want to get away from your mom and dad, can't you just – "

"No, it's not only them. Don't be thinking that they're ogres, John. They're good people, and I love them very much."

"So you're leaving town without telling them where you're going? They'll go crazy."

"They're on an overnight trip with friends. I told them I had a headache. They won't even know I'm gone until tomorrow, and I left a note for them. It has our code words in it that mean I'm OK, so they won't think someone took me away and forced me to write the note or anything."

He paused to register that last sentence. "You – your family has code words for 'I'm OK'?"

A little bubble of tear-filled laughter. "Just scratching the surface, John."

He heard a voice that sounded like it was coming over a public-address system, though he couldn't discern the words. "Where are you?"

"Oh, I'm at the airport in Kansas City."

"I want to talk to you. I mean, see you. There's got to be something else you can do besides running away. You – I don't believe you're a coward."

"I don't really think I'm running away from anything. I think I'm running toward something, toward a new life. Maybe if I'm any good at it, I'll deserve a guy like you someday. Right now – " She sobbed. "Right now I just don't."

"Mary, that's – "

"I have to go. I – You find someone really good, John. We hardly even know each other, we'll get over each other. I have to go." She hung up.

After a moment, he hung up too.

So, that was it.

Something was being irreparably torn in his chest.

No. He refused to believe it.

But realistically, he had no choice. He couldn't just snap an order at her to stay. If she wanted to go, she could go.

Without any attempt on his part to get her to stay?

He'd made an attempt. It hadn't worked.

What in the hell was she running from?

From him?

He shook his head as though there were someone else in the room to see him. No, if her main reason for leaving was to get away from him, she wouldn't have called. She could have slipped away, giving him no more notice than she was giving her family.

"I have to get away from my family," she'd said – as well as, "They're good people, and I love them very much."

And they had code words for "I'm OK."

So – maybe she wasn't running from them because they were bad to her, but because of something they were, or had done –

A smile flashed across his face. Yeah, they were violent protestors, Minutemen types, on the run from the law. Samuel would plant the bombs, Deana act as lookout –

Actually, he could kind of see it.

Or something more mundane, maybe. They'd robbed a bank or held up some liquor stores. Anyway, something to make Mary want to get away from the darkness and secrecy of their lives, while still loving them as her parents.

Which meant that to persuade her to come back, he'd have to persuade her that living across town from them would distance her from their crimes as effectively as taking a plane.

As if he could persuade her of anything. He had no idea where she was going, except that you went by plane.

Actually – did he even know that?

He sat down slowly, his gaze abstracted.

You're a young woman. You've been working part-time and saving your money in anticipation of moving. You're not rash and you're not dumb. You check to see if the place you're going has jobs available. Then you decide to go and you clean out your savings account. Then –

– you take a bus to Kansas City and buy an airplane ticket? How much would that take of all the money you have to live on?

He sat up straighter.

And furthermore, if you're calling from a pay phone in the Kansas City airport for at least five or six minutes, why does the recording not come on the line to request more money?

He smiled a little, shook his head. No, of course not. She'd either take a train or a bus. And he'd bet his bottom dollar that the incomprehensible loudspeaker voice he'd heard had been at the InterState Coach Lines terminal downtown.

But if the voice had been announcing the departure of her bus, it didn't matter if she'd been in town five minutes ago. By the time he got to the bus station –

Well, a lot of buses leave from a bus terminal. Maybe she was still waiting there.

So if she'd made all her plans and was sitting there waiting for a bus, what gave him the right to try to stop her?

Nothing. But he wanted to stop her anyway. At the very least, he wanted to talk to her face to face. He wanted to try to understand, and he wanted to be certain in his own mind that she wasn't planning something like trying to live in the jungles of the Yucatan or jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. He wanted her to look at him, of her own free will, under no duress from anywhere, and tell him that she wanted to go and that she had plans that would keep her safe. The two of them didn't have a code word for "I'm OK."

All right. Decision made, he jumped to his feet. And stopped dead.

His father had the car in Jefferson City.

He spent the next few minutes making phone calls to people he knew in the neighborhood and to his friends from high school who were still in town. No one was home. Everyone must be visiting out-of-town relatives or at after-Thanksgiving sales.

So, the alternatives. Waiting for and riding the bus downtown would be slow, but he had the feeling that calling a taxi and waiting for it would take about the same amount of time, and at least he could get started walking and grab the bus when he saw it.

About twenty minutes later, he leaped off the bus six blocks from the terminal and ran, knowing at that distance his feet would make better time.

The station consisted of a small waiting area divided by a massive old stone wall from a large garage-like structure where buses came and went. One was pulling out just as he yanked open the door to the waiting room. One glance around was all he needed to know that Mary wasn't in the waiting area, and he headed up to the ticket counter.

There was no line; he assumed that the Friday of Thanksgiving weekend was a pretty dead day for the travel industry. Nonetheless, the middle-aged woman at the ticket counter looked tired.

"Hi," he said. "I think there was a girl here about half an hour ago. Thin, blonde hair, very pretty. She made a phone call. Her name's Mary Campbell. She might've seemed kind of upset. Was she here?"

"Yes."

"Great. Did she get on a bus already?"

"Why do you need to know?"

He literally hadn't anticipated that question, but his hesitation was minimal. "Oh, she's my fiancée. We had a big fight. I didn't realize how important she is to me. I've got to try to get her back."

"She left town just because you two had a fight?"

He smiled as charmingly as he knew how. "She's kind of impulsive. It's actually part of what I love about her. I think she may have gone to visit her family, but I'm not sure."

"Where does her family live?"

"They're kind of scattered. Some – " Quick, think of heavily populated areas where buses would be almost sure to go – "Some are in Texas, some over in California, and her mother's back on the East Coast somewhere, Boston or New York."

"That's a pretty scattered family."

"It is. The thing is, they're all crazy in their own way, but she loves them all. She could be running to any of them."

"Or she could just be running away from you." She held up her hand as John started to speak. "Don't bother. I can't tell you a passenger's travel plans, but even if I was allowed to I wouldn't. You could be some kind of a maniac. If she wants you to know where she is, she'll call you."

John stood for a moment, reading utter recalcitrance n the woman's face, and turned away. Someday, he thought, he'd probably be grateful to the woman for being so protective of Mary. But today was not that day.

He sat on an empty bench to think. Could he deduce it? They'd been together three times and talked on the telephone. Had she said anything in those conversations that would give a clue where she might be headed?

He knew she wanted to go to college, but that didn't exactly narrow it down. And then he remembered the first time he'd met her and they'd had coffee. "I'm going to see Hollywood someday, do all the tourist things. And I want to walk barefoot on the beach and pick up seashells."

He didn't really see her as wanting to live in Los Angeles, though. It had sounded more like her idea of a great vacation, someplace she'd want close by so she could see it, but not necessarily –

He sat up straighter. Of course!

How could he have forgotten it? It was something she'd said at dinner at her house: "The ideal would be a small or a mid-sized town, like Lawrence or maybe larger, with farm country around it, but you could easily get to castles and deserts and museums right from it." And as she'd said it, a little wicked smile had come across her face, the smile of Miss July.

It was the first time he'd seen the expression in person, and he'd been so enraptured that he hadn't really wondered what in that sentence had caused it. Now he knew. She'd told him this afternoon that she'd been planning this move; she'd have been thinking about it at dinner that night. And she'd been thinking about it when she posed for the calendar, stashing the money she'd earned for it in the account she closed out this afternoon.

Castles?

"Right," he murmured, stood and left the waiting room, breaking into a run as soon as he hit the sidewalk.

He couldn't run the seven blocks at top speed; there were still unexpected icy patches on the sidewalk after a previous rainy freeze, and a broken ankle was the last thing he needed now. Both auto and foot traffic were heavy as he crossed the street by Weaver's department store, people headed home in deep twilight for post-shopping dinner. But he'd made pretty good time as he sprang up the steps between the pillars of a small elegant Beaux Arts building with "Lawrence City Library" set in stone over the door.

He was breathing heavily when he got to the reference desk, and the thin bespectacled woman there looked slightly unnerved as he approached. "Can I help you?"

"Do you have a road atlas?"

It was lying on a shelf right behind her. "It can't be checked out, but you can take your time looking at it," she said, handing it to him.

"Thanks," and he headed for a nearby table.

The atlas was a couple of years out of date, but he didn't think that would matter. He flipped it open, looking for California, and discovered that Southern California had its own double-page spread.

He knew that Hollywood was somewhere around Los Angeles, but there was no specific notation for it in the atlas. He'd always thought it was a separate city, but apparently not. So all right, Hollywood was just part of Los Angeles. And, of course, there were dozens of beaches near it. He put his finger on the map where L.A. met the coastline.

Now, "America's Castle." He remembered it was called that, and he was pretty sure it was close to the coast, north of Los Angeles. And there it was, "Hearst San Simeon St Hist Mon."

He grabbed a pencil and piece of paper meant for note-taking from the center of the library table. He shot a look at the reference librarian, whose back was to him, and, using the paper as a straight edge, drew a line from Los Angeles near the coast to San Simeon.

Now, deserts. That might be hard to narrow down; the Mojave covered a massive area. But in the northeast part of the map was an area outlined in green, "Death Valley National Monument." And inside that was a spot labeled "Lowest Point in US."

He could see it mentally; he didn't even have to close his eyes. Mary, wearing a snug-fitting pair of jeans and a sleeveless top, raising her hand to shade her eyes from the sun with her charm bracelet sparkling on her arm, standing smiling by a marker to have her picture taken at the lowest point in the U.S. He'd get her there, one way or another. He hoped she'd agree to come back to Lawrence with him and let him earn money and vacation time, but if she insisted he'd go with her literally to the ends of the earth.

He looked westward to find San Simeon again, and his gaze stopped. There, between Death Valley and San Simeon, slightly to the north, was Sequoia National Park.

("They're so beautiful, or at least the pictures of them are. And they live so long. They see everything.")

He drew a line from San Simeon to the center of the park, from there to the lowest spot in the U.S. He thought for a moment more, then completed the quadrangle with a line from Death Valley to Los Angeles.

He examined the lumpy diamond he'd drawn, trying to see if there was someplace central to all four points. There was only one town in that area that looked to be of significant size, and all highways in the area led to it.

"Bakersfield?" he murmured, bemused.

Well, it sure as hell wasn't the jungles of the Yucatan.

He'd known a few guys from California in the Corps. For them, Bakersfield was the punch line of a joke.

But then Kansas was a punch line too, and he liked living here. Maybe Mary had done enough research to convince her that Bakersfield was the place for her to escape her family's shame, whatever it was.

But no college. The map of "Los Angeles and Vicinity" on the next two pages was peppered with little mortarboard caps labeled with college or university names. But almost nowhere else inside his quadrangle was there anything like a college.

So maybe it was L.A., after all? Even the farthest point of the quadrangle was less than 200 miles away from Los Angeles. And a lot of pretty girls went there for glamour, adventure.

Yes. Which is exactly why Mary wouldn't. He was sure of it.

He stared at the atlas a moment longer. Well, after all, it was a couple years out of date. John went back to the reference librarian. "What's the fastest way I can find current information on Bakersfield, California?"

Two minutes later he was back at the table holding The Encyclopedia of American Cities, Volume 2. The book crackled with newness when he opened it; the copyright date was just last year.

"BAKERSFIELD, Calif. Population 69,515 (1970). County: Kern. A metropolitan anchor to California's richly agricultural San Joaquin Valley, Bakersfield was founded in 1869, and in the years since World War II has become one of the fastest-growing cities in a fast-growing state. Citrus fruit, potatoes and tomatoes are among the crops grown and processed there. Oil extraction and refining also are important to the city's economy.

"Bakersfield and Kern County established themselves as the educational heart of Central California in 1965 when they jointly won a bid to establish a state college. California State College, Bakersfield, the only provider of four-year degrees within a hundred-mile radius, opened in 1970 with Schools of Humanities and Social Sciences, Business and Public Administration, Natural Sciences and Mathematics, and Education."

("Do you think I'd make a good teacher?")

He read the next couple of paragraphs, but he didn't really need to. What he needed to do was get to the bus station as fast as he could, because he was pretty sure he could startle a confirmation of Mary's destination out of the woman at the ticket counter.

But, if he couldn't catch her bus, so what?


	7. The Tracker

_The television show "Supernatural," including the characters John Winchester, Mary Campbell, Samuel Campbell, and Deana Campbell, is copyrighted by Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc._

Well. He could always wait a week or two, start calling Information to see if they had a new listing for M. Campbell in Bakersfield. He could be a very patient guy if he were taking actions that he knew needed some time to come to fruition; but sitting around waiting for Mary to get telephone service halfway across the country did not qualify as taking action. No, he needed a car. Now. One that he could keep for a couple of days if necessary.

He shook his head at what he was thinking. Curt was a nice guy and a good employer. Stealing property from his company was hardly the way to repay him for that. And even the nicest guy had a limit. John could wind up paying reparations, with an arrest on his record for life, maybe even jail time. Were those consequences, and the betrayal of an employer who trusted him, worth the chance of catching Mary before she disappeared?

It wouldn't be if Mary had sounded excited and happy about her adventure. But she'd been crying and distressed. "I got a look inside myself. It's nothing good, John." That didn't sound like, To heck with my bank-robbing parents. That sounded like self-hatred. He knew that, even if he found her loveable and admirable in every way, she might despise herself, and he feared any life-changing decisions anyone made out of self-hatred.

It was a little more than a mile to Lawrence Used Auto. He made it in 11 minutes. Sixth Street had oddly fluctuating zoning, everything from a power substation to a car wash to a school on one side of the street, single-family homes and professional offices on the other. Some of the businesses' lights were on against the darkness, and some of the homes already had strings of Christmas lights glowing warmly. He tried to stick to running on grass on the residential side, but still took a nasty slide and fall on an unexpected slick spot. He stood up, walked slowly for a moment, then sped up again.

Within half a block of the car lot, he stopped suddenly and crouched behind the shrubbery at the border of someone's yard. Curt's car was in the driveway of the lot, idling. Curt himself was standing at the gate that blocked the driveway, winding a chain around the closing and clicking a padlock shut. He got back into his car and drove off.

That was the extent of the security at Lawrence Used Auto in 1972. A low fence with concrete posts every few yards ran around the lot, the entry gate was chained and padlocked, there were floodlights on the lot, and the keys of the cars were in a locked cabinet in the locked office of the locked building. The fence could be stepped over, and if you had a key to the building and office, you knew where the key to the cabinet was kept.

With the office blinds drawn, by the light only of a desk lamp, John stood staring at the rows of keys.

It embarrassed him that he felt like he should take the Impala. He didn't think of himself as a sentimentalist. But the idea of taking any other car in pursuit of Miss July just seemed wrong.

Well, after all, he'd worked on the Impala so often that he knew every quirk it had. And its cold would help keep him alert if he wound up having to make an all-night drive.

He didn't consider too carefully the note that he left on Curt's desk. "Curt: I took the Impala. Sorry. I'll bring in back in a day or two and settle up. John Winchester."

There was a spare key to the gate's padlock in the office, too. John fastened the gate behind him and headed for the InterState Coach terminal.

The same woman was still working behind the counter, her gaze focused downward on some paperwork. When John strode up in front of her she looked a bit startled, as if trying to place his face.

"So," John said, "when my fiancée brought her ticket for Bakersfield, what bus did she get on?"

She looked astonished, and that was all the confirmation he needed. Then she looked reluctant, but it wasn't like she could delay his knowing; the bus schedules were right there. "Ah – the Heartland 35 bus to Oklahoma City, connecting with the Sunbelt 40 route to Bakersfield."

"Can I get the timetables?"

He ran his eyes down the list of Heartland 35 bus stops. The bus had left Lawrence at 5:10, almost exactly an hour ago, and just at the time he'd arrived at the bus station. He didn't waste time with irritation. Fortunately, the next stop had been a half-hour stop for dinner in Topeka; that would help. But there were few other stops, and those were brief. The soonest chance that he had to catch the bus was in Wichita, where a 15-minute stop was scheduled from 8:30 to 8:45. And if not there, well – he had the Sunbelt 40 timetable.

He ran outside and jumped into the illegally-parked Impala. "OK, buddy," he said aloud, "I don't care if you freeze me, just don't give me any trouble on the way."

The engine roared as he turned the key, as if were agreeing to the deal.

The holiday weekend helped him. There wasn't much traffic on the highway, and the one time that he failed to notice the lower speed limit as he sped through a small town, no police officer was lurking; they were probably waiting for Sunday, when everyone and his dog would be on the road. His high beams mostly revealed pitch-dark empty stretches of road; going up an incline he could see crests of the gently rolling Flint Hills dimly outlined, black on midnight blue. Wanting to focus, he didn't turn on the radio. The only sounds were the Impala's roar, the shrill cold air breaking around the windshield and screaming past the window, the occasional powerful rumble and whoosh of a truck going the opposite direction.

Twenty miles outside of Wichita he spotted a gas station and pulled over to buy four dollars worth of gas and a road map that showed him where the Wichita terminal was. When he hit the gas station it was 8:20. He shook his head with a slight grimace, but all he could do was keep going.

The traffic on the highway picked up considerably after that point, and when he got off the highway he was a little surprised at the amount of traffic on the streets. Of course he'd known that Wichita was the biggest city in Kansas, but still the amount of traffic on a holiday weekend surprised and frustrated him. He drove at what seemed a crawl, trying to read unfamiliar street signs, jamming on his brakes when a drunk driver wove suddenly in front of him.

But there it was, up ahead, a well lit sign. "InterState Coach."

There was a parking lot next to the street, and a two-way drive between that and the depot itself. As he pulled into the drive he saw a bus parked facing the opposite direction. Its lights went on as he moved closer, and the sign over its windshield lit up: "Heartland 35."

With a push to the accelerator and a hard twist of the wheel, he brought the Impala around sideways, directly in front of the bus, blocking the whole driveway.

By the time he had the car turned off and was on the sidewalk, the driver was out of the bus. "Mister, I don't care if –"

"I have to talk to someone on the bus. It's a family emergency."

The bus driver, a big middle-aged guy, studied John's face for a moment. "What's the passenger's name?"

"Mary. Mary Campbell."

"What's your name?"

"John Winchester."

"Stay here," the driver said, but when he turned his back John followed him onto the bus.

At the moment the only light in the bus was coming in the windows from the depot and streetlights, but even having to look around the driver's bulk, John spotted the top of Mary's head about halfway back.

"Mary Campbell?" the driver called.

Her slender arm went up, tentatively. "I – that's me."

"Mary, I have to talk to you," John said.

She stood straight up. "John?"

Her voice mingled love with utter astonishment, and someone on the bus murmured a knowing, "Oooo."

"I just need five minutes," John said.

The bus driver turned. "You haven't got five minutes. Miss Campbell, is this guy a member of your family?"

"Yes." She lied as easily as though she'd done it hundreds of times, and maybe she had.

"If she gets off the bus, and she has a ticket clear to Oklahoma City, and she catches up with you later, can she get back on?" John asked.

"Yeah."

"Mary, please give me five minutes," John said. "If you don't want to come back, I swear I'll drive you through to Bakersfield myself if I have to. I just need to understand why you left."

She stood silent, her face unreadable in the semi-darkness, for a moment. Then she reached up and began pulling a medium-sized suitcase down from an upper rack.

"I can't get your luggage out of the compartment," the bus driver warned.

"I don't have any there. I travel light."

John worked his way around the driver and took the suitcase from Mary. She picked up a big tote bag and a large purse from the seat next to her, and the two began working their way back to the door. A teenage girl burst into giggles and a guy in the back called, "Go get 'er, Romeo!"

John wanted to kiss her or give her a passionate declaration of love, but as he helped her down onto the sidewalk he had to say, "Just throw your bags in the back. I've got to move this car before this driver runs over it. Then we'll talk."

She put a hand on his arm, gently took the suitcase from him and set it down, looked up at him with an inscrutable expression. "Go ahead and move the car. I'm – I can't get in it until you answer some questions."

Actually, the expression wasn't inscrutable. It was distrusting and – fearful? No time to analyze, the driver had closed the bus door. "You – You'll stay here."

"I'll stay here."

He leaped into the car, checked the driveway, started the engine and pulled into the parking lot, the bus roaring down the driveway as soon as he cleared it.

John's mind was racing. He'd expected any reaction from a joyous embrace to an angry, "Let me live my own life" – but fear? What had he done to earn that?

He thought fast while he parked the car, keeping one eye the whole time on the delicate figure in jeans and work shirt standing by the curb with her bags around her. Continuing with the theory that her parents were wanted by the law, what would she think if he suddenly turned up at her bus? When she hadn't told him where she was going?

Maybe she thought he was a cop or a Fed of some kind, or some sort of criminal enemy her parents had made back in the day. Maybe she thought that he was just using her to get at them, that he'd known where she was because he'd followed her or had some network of agents or informants spying on her.

He hoped that was it, he thought as he loped across the driveway. He could argue that down. If she'd literally left town to get away from him, he didn't know how –

But then why would she get off the bus?

He stood with her under the lights out front of the terminal. "All right, I'm ready to answer questions. But keep in mind, I've got some questions too."

"How could you – possibly – know where I was? And where I'm going?"

"Well, I figured that if you only have the proceeds of a savings account to live off of, you're not going to blow a big part of it on a plane ticket. I mean, I'm working on the assumption that you don't have hidden millions and you're not dumb. I just figured it would make more sense for you to take a bus. At the bus station the lady said she'd seen you but wouldn't tell me where you were going. So I started thinking about some things you'd said . . . "

He told her the story in detail, watching the fear leave her eyes and mouth, to be slowly replaced by amusement and finally astonishment. "You remembered all that? All those things I said?"

He shrugged a little. "I pay attention."

She laughed, putting her hand over her heart as though she were recuperating from a bad scare. "You sure do."

"Any other questions?"

"I – no. Well – " She was obviously flustered. "Why? Did you do all that? You could be in so much trouble for stealing that car."

"I'd've done more than that. Lots more."

She sighed. "But you'd have done it for someone you don't know."

"No. I wouldn't have. I know you, Mary. Sure I don't know all _about_ you, what made you all of a sudden decide you had to take off. But I know you wouldn't do it just to get attention. I know you feel like there's a good reason for it. And I know you're not – there's nothing about you that could be bad enough that I'd want to get rid of you."

There were tears in her eyes. "If you knew – If I could tell you – "

He waited, but she wasn't going to go farther than that.

"Look," he said. "I'm just going to say some things. You don't have to confirm or deny. Just hear me out. OK?"

She nodded.

"I think that your parents have some kind of trouble that they're running from or hiding out from. Maybe it's some kind of trouble with the law. You love them, but you're tired of hiding or lying. You don't want to live like them. But for some reason, today you thought you were starting to be like them. Maybe you caught yourself wanting to do something wrong, or wanting to take the easy way out from something. And you thought, I've got to get out now, before I turn into them."

He paused to read the expression on her face. She was actually smiling, albeit ruefully.

"Actually surprisingly close," she said.

"OK. But I'm telling you that you don't need to run. You're not going to turn into them. You're thinking that your character is weak, but it's not. It's strong. You're strong, and you're honest."

"How do you know?"

"If you weren't, I wouldn't love you enough to do all this tonight. I sure wouldn't want to marry you."

Her eyes flew wide open.

"I just can't do it right now. You know my situation. I'm working part-time for another month. I don't have a house, hell, I don't even have a car. I want to stay in the same town with Dad long enough to make sure that he gets out of his hermit shell and starts, you know, living a life."

"And I wouldn't – We hardly know each other, John. We couldn't get married anyway. Right now."

"Exactly. But how are we going to get to know each other better if you're in California? No, don't – I know, there's something awful about you, and once I know it I won't want to marry you anyway. But suppose you're wrong? Suppose I'm a pretty strong character, too?"

She laughed with a choke, put her hand to her lips, tears spilling out of her eyes. "I never doubted it."

"Then give me six months. Just six months to get myself settled, help Dad, and let you get to know me better. I'll help you with a place to live if you can't stand living with your folks. At the end of six months, if you still want to move to Bakersfield by yourself, I'll buy you a bus ticket. I'll owe you one anyway. If you want me to come with you, I will. If you never want to hear from me again, I'll stay away. Just give me the next six months. Please."

She didn't look at him for a long moment. Then she took a step forward, put her arms around his neck, and kissed him.

He seized her almost fiercely, feeling like he'd kept her from sliding off a cliff, like he'd almost lost her forever.

The cheerful jeers of a couple of teenage boys brought him back, and seemed to bring her back, too. She laughed a little, but they pulled apart very slowly.

"You don't need to find me a place to live," she said. "I can stay there without – If I know what my goal is, I can keep myself from – "

She didn't finish the sentence, and he didn't ask her to. He picked up her suitcase and tote bag, she picked up her purse, and they began walking to the car.

"I've got to remember to get rid of my note to Mom and Dad when we get back," she said. "If I do that, they'll never even know any of this happened."

"Well, I'll have to confess to Curt because of the extra mileage on the Impala. But if the car's sitting there in the lot undamaged, it'll be easier to work it out with him. Hey!" he said suddenly. "You're not gonna believe this, but I drove the Impala all the way down here and it didn't get cold. The heating works perfectly."

She laughed a little explosively. "All your work finally paid off."

"I don't know how. It's been days since I worked on it."

"What else could it be?" she asked, slanting a smile up at him.

"Maybe the highway-speed driving was what it needed, on top of the work," he mused. "It's a great car." He patted the trunk before opening it. "How'd you like to start married life with this beauty for transportation?"

"Oh – I – " He was surprised at her hesitation. "I'm not really sure I like it. I mean, it's a beautiful car. But don't you think it would be better to have something more practical?"

He loaded her bags into the trunk and closed it. "Well, maybe you're right. It'll probably be sold by the time I'd be ready to buy it anyway."

He opened the passenger-side door for her, and allowed himself a grin over the top of the car as she got in. He could be a pretty determined cuss when he wanted to be. He'd managed to get Mary back, and he'd manage to persuade her to like the Impala too. It would be awhile – he not only had a car to save up for, but first and last months' rent on a good big apartment and an engagement ring. And maybe the Impala would be gone by the time he was ready to make an offer on it. But somehow, he didn't think it would be.

He got into the car, put the key into the ignition. "Last call for Bakersfield."

"Last chance to get out of a difficult relationship."

He laughed. "No, ma'am. I like a challenge."

She gave him a loving smile and his heart leaped. The Impala fired up as though it couldn't wait to get home. This would be their future – Mr. and Mrs. Winchester, driving their car home from a family vacation at night, kids sleeping in the back seat, his own business waiting for him the next day. It would take time, but if he knew what he was working toward, he could be patient. And determined. And Mary would always be there to help.


End file.
